Last of the Cetra
by Proteus DMC
Summary: The Cetra were all but extinct.  Jenova chose a champion to purge the world in revenge.  AVALANCHE must save humanity, but this time, the Lifestream's not on their side.
1. Chapter 1: The Dying Earth

**1**

**The Dying Earth**

Rufus Shinra stood mesmerized by the thing in front of him. Its mouth was frozen agape; its glossy eyes empty; pleading for release. The two-meter sword had delivered that release and impaled its torso to the long, glossy desk. Blood dried into vermillion stains scattered across the office. It fascinated Rufus in a strange way that as hard as he tried, he could not think of the corpse of his father as anything other than a "thing."

He was barely aware of the others talking around him. The slender blonde and the portly man with the unkempt beard had not stopped chattering since their arrival. Rufus' body quivered, but he was not angry. He was not even upset. The vermillion exhilarated him. In this aftermath of death, he felt more alive than he could ever remember.

A cool breeze wafted through the skyscraper office. Features of the night sky over Midgar were invisible for the light pollution. Through the shattered window, Rufus could see only dots of light far below: each one a window or a home or an office; each one filled with men and women oblivious to a stark truth: the world was about to end.

"I'm telling you, this _is_ General Sephiroth's sword," the woman to Rufus' right said.

"We've had no reports that General Sephiroth survived the bombardment of Nibelheim. No one has seen the man in two years." The bearded man said. "That's impossible."

"If you don't believe just take five goddamn minutes and watch the surveillance video."

"President Shinra doesn't _have_ a surveillance camera in his office."

"It… was an outside camera."

"The hall?"

"No. _Outside the building!_"

"You don't think every man in this building would have recognized General Sephiroth the moment he walked through the door, Scarlet?"

"He didn't walk through the door… He… _flew_ in."

"He escaped through the window…"

"Dammit Heideggar! He flew! Like… like a helicopter or a bird. Just watch the damn footage already!"

He laughed. "And since when did our long-since gone general learn how to fly?"

The pair seemed startled by Rufus' voice as though his presence had been forgotten. "He's not Sephiroth anymore, General Heideggar. You've seen Professor Gast's records. You should know full well that if he survived Nibelheim, it's because he's no longer human."

Heideggar, Shinra Electric's Director of Public Security paled. "You don't think that was all true?"

"Jenova was exactly where the Cetra, Ifalna, predicted it would be. We could talk all night; discuss the plausibility of a flying dead man murdering President Shinra. It makes no sense. It's ridiculous. But here we are," Rufus waved to the cadaver. "Here _he_ is." Saying "he" required effort.

The door opened. The silky-haired man clad in a crisp blue suit approached. His eyes widened. Rufus knew the leader of the Turks had seen his share of horrors. Still, whether for the copious blood or the putrid stench of nearly every human body fluid intermingling, he reacted with shock.

"Report, Tseng," Heideggar said.

The Turk snapped his eyes away from the blood-soiled desk of his former employer. "We did it. We recovered the Cetra's daughter."

"Were there any complications?" Heideggar said.

"None. As instructed, she's had a shadow ever since we recovered Professor Hojo's research. It was easy," Tseng said.

"Heideggar. You and Scarlet will review the surveillance footage and meet me in the war room in an hour," Rufus said.

They saluted in unison. "Sir!"

Rufus turned to Tseng. "Lead me."

Tseng nodded and followed Rufus after a fleeting glance at the desk. "Yes Ru… Mr. President."

Any disgust at the death of his father washed away. Even the fear of imminent death subsided. Becoming leader of the free world seemed to make a great many things better.

Rufus Shinra had been born for this role. By all rights, he was overdue for the presidency. Later, he would have to make a few calls. Within the past hour, "General Sephiroth" had made some of Rufus' plans obsolete.

Rufus boarded the elevator and selected Shinra Tower's sixty-sixth floor. The elevator shuddered. Its pale blue light flickered for only a moment. He cocked an eyebrow.

"I heard repairs to Mako Reactor Number Five will be completed sometime tomorrow. AVALANCHE hit it pretty hard, but Urban Redevelopment's been working around the clock to get it back online. I'll be glad when these brownouts end," Tseng said.

The elevator stopped. The two men emerged into a long hallway lit by bright iridescent light.

"Tell me about this last of the Ancients," Rufus said.  
"She's a flower girl," Tseng said.

"A flower girl?"

"Yes, Mr. President. She sold flowers out of an abandoned cathedral in the Sector Five slums."

"What was the heiress to the most ancient and powerful race in the world doing selling flowers in a slum?"

"I guess someone's gotta do it," a voice chimed from around the corner.

When Rufus recognized the new voice, he paused. He tempered his irritation. "I heard you did well, Reno. Elena."

Rufus recognized the Turk's spiky red hair before he recognized any distinctive features of his face. His teammate, a young blond woman followed behind.

"I did good boss," Reno said. "Treated her like a real lady. Didn't leave a mark on her."

The blond woman rolled her eyes.

"Maybe that will change," Rufus said. "I need answers from this girl and I need you to do whatever it takes to get them, Reno."

Reno took a half-step back. He and the blonde caught each other's eyes.

"Where's Rude?" Rufus said.

"Keeping an eye on her," Reno said.

Tseng approached a narrow cell and swiped a pass card. The door opened.

Her auburn hair was bound by a ribbon, tapering down in a long braid. Ringlets framed a face startling in its innocence. The metal shackles could not have been more out of place behind her long, pink dress.

"_Please, already!_" She cried. "I just need to make a phone call. I can do that, right?"

Rufus knew had the bald Turk not been wearing sunglasses, they might have seen traces of a smile in his eyes.

"I just need to call my mother. I need to let her know I'm all right. You have my PHS? I can call her really quickly…"

The Turk, Rude, took the small electronic device from his pocket. He snapped it in half and threw it against the wall.

The flower girl looked as though she had been slapped. For the first time, she noticed the new arrivals and the stark white suit of one drew her gaze. She met the icy blue eyes of the strikingly handsome man with layered blond hair. He had a memorable face: one not easily forgotten even if he were not one of the world's most famous men. "Mr. Rufus Shinra, sir? Please. Help me. I don't know what I'm doing here… I haven't done anything…"

Rufus gestured to the Turk, Rude, who stood and walked away. Rufus took a seat opposite the girl. "Tell me young lady. What brings a jewel like you to a place like this?"

The flower girl spoke deliberately. "I was working… Selling flowers. When one of them grabbed me and threw a bag over my head. Please, sir, where am I? Am…" She paused. "Is this Shinra Tower?"

Rufus lifted her chin and noticed her eyes. They were a blue-green as vibrant and clear as mako. "Working… I didn't know there was that much money in selling flowers. Don't most pretty young things like you from Sector Five supplement their income somehow?"

She recoiled from his touch. "What are you implying?"

"Nothing. I will be forthcoming with you if you do the same. You _are_ being held in Shinra Tower… by my order. When you are released… no… _if_ you are released will be decided by my whim. I suspect you can help me with a problem. We'd help each other out. By helping me, you could ensure our survival _and_ your own."

The flower girl paused. "I want to speak with your father! I want to speak with the President of Shinra. If I'm going to be held here, I need to know why."

"My father is dead, young lady. You _are_ speaking with the President of Shinra."

She paused. "Then I need to speak with the Mayor of Midgar!"

"Midgar belongs to Shinra Electric and so does its mayor. Its power grid is all thanks to our mako reactors. Our civilization rides on the back of Shinra Electric. All of that to say, I can do whatever I damn well please. And I will. Whatever it takes to break your mind… spirit… or body… to find out what I need to know, I will do it. The stakes are that high."

The flower girl dropped her head. She began to choke. Finally, she began to sob. "_Oh my God, please don't hurt me._"

"I don't have to hurt you. None of us do. All I ask is that you make this as easy and painless as possible."

The flower girl nodded.

Rufus Shinra leaned in towards her, nose to nose. "Now Cetra… you will tell me everything you know about Omega Weapon."

Aerith Gainsborough blinked away her tears. "_Cetra? What?_"

* * *

Author's Note:

So there it is: my first public posting of Fanfiction. I hope some people enjoy it! I'm planning on this being a long story. The next few chapters should be posted over the coming weeks.


	2. Chapter 2: Trap

**2**

**Trap**

"_You know, I've been thinking Wedge._"

"_What's up, Biggs?_"

"_The nightly news calls us terrorists._"

"_What?_"

"_You know. 'The terrorist organization, AVALANCHE…'_"

"…_Yeah?_"

"_Well. We kind of are terrorists, aren't we?_"

_"Huh?"_

"_I mean… we target Shinra Electric sites. We try to minimize casualties… who aren't Public Safety goons. But still. In the end of the day, we still do our best to create havoc and scare people._"

"_One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter, my friend._"

Cid Highwind spoke into his headset. "Biggs, are you fucking retarded? Don't talk about shit like that over the radio. Even if it is encrypted."

"_Sorry, sir!_"

Cid ran a finger through his wiry blond hair. He was the oldest one in the nearly vacant subway car; not old by any means, though he was not aging well. He took a puff from his cigarette. "Green sons of bitches…"

Light flickered through the dim subway car. For only a moment, they could see the sun high above and as quickly as it appeared, it vanished behind Shinra Tower. The darkness of a tunnel enshrouded them. The man and woman by Cid's side adjusted their headsets and long black coats. There was a lot concealed beneath those coats.

"Anything out of the normal, Cait?" Cid said.

A black and white feline face peered out from underneath Cid's own coat. The mechanical creature shook its head. "Nothing at all, Cid. I don't think Shinra's listening. Public Security frequencies are pretty quiet."

Cid spoke into his headset. "You guys there yet, Biggs? Wedge?"

"_I'm just getting to the rendezvous point._"

"_I see Biggs now._"

"_We're waving to each other._"

Cid grumbled. "Lovely. Are you ready, Jessie? Yuffie?"

"_I'm at point Epsilon with the truck. Waiting._" a female voice said.

"_Roger-ee-doo,_" a second said.

The subway train buckled and rocked. A barely-audible voice announced the station. The young man with erect blond hair adjusted his sunglasses. "This is our stop," he said. "Ready, Tifa?"

The young woman took in a deep breath and nodded once.

Cid patted Cloud Strife on the shoulder. "Remember, I'll meet you both at the rendezvous point. Give that Shinra scum hell, you two."

The subway door slid open. Half a dozen noxious odors from the city street wafted in on a gust of damp, hot air. Cloud tapped Tifa on the shoulder. She stepped away from his touch as they walked out the door.

The mechanical cat looked up to Cid and attempted to speak quietly. "So… Tifa never told me what their deal is anyway…"

Cid rolled his eyes.

The subway door shut.

Cloud and Tifa pretended they had not heard the remark. He navigated her through a long, narrow alleyway. This block of town was filled with vacant, decaying brick buildings. Only an eerie silence weighed heavy in the air. The streets of uptown Midgar were neither clean nor particularly safe. They both knew they might have a little something to do with the latter.

"You ready for this, Tifa?" Cloud said.

Tifa Lockhart would not look him in the eye, but nodded. "As I'll ever be."

Cloud found the beige tarp alongside a dumpster. They were behind a little Wutainese restaurant. Tifa glanced at the back door as voices rose in the kitchen. No one reputable ever ate there, but Yuffie and Barret enjoyed it well enough.

Cases in point.

Cloud cast aside the tarp and mounted the squat motorcycle beneath. Tifa approached behind Cloud and clasped her hands tightly across his abdomen. The girth of his waist surprised her. The black coats were to blame. She pressed herself to his back and nodded.

Cloud powered up the motorcycle and they squealed out into the crowded street.

* * *

"Don't look at me that way," Heideggar said.

Aerith was not looking at him. She would not. Her eyes fixed on an invisible point down and ahead. She sniffled.

The armored truck jostled over a pothole. "It's nothing personal you know. Just business," he said.

That made her look. Heideggar noticed how swollen the bruise over her left eye looked in the pale blue light of the enclosed cabin.

Two armed Shinra guards fidgeted nearby, their expressionless mouths the only parts of their faces visible for their bug-eyed ceramic helmets.

"If you had told them something… anything," Heideggar said, "They wouldn't have done that to you."

Aerith rubbed a tear away on her shoulder and looked back down.

Heideggar crossed and uncrossed his legs. "So… what's in Cosmo Canyon anyhow?"

Aerith blinked.

"I mean… Rufus… President Shinra, sorry… says, 'take her to the Cosmo Canyon research facility, Heideggar. I'll meet you there.' Why? For what purpose?"

Aerith's voice cracked with rage. "I will say one thing to you and one thing only."

Heideggar looked up.

"The only man I've ever loved lost his life in the service of Shinra. Until now, I've never been anything but proud of him for it. Be thankful he's not alive to see this."

Heideggar studied her face. "So… you're not going to tell me what's in Cosmo Canyon. I could make it worth your while." He glanced at the soldiers. "Rufus Shinra isn't the only man in this town with friends and influence."

Aerith whispered under her breath. Heideggar heard only "asshole."

"Careful there sweetheart," Heideggar said. "That shiner you've got there. It could use a friend."

Aerith lowered her head and remained quiet as the convoy drove towards the outskirts of Midgar.

* * *

The Shinra research facility was at least ten stories tall and not nearly as old as its surroundings. It had been built within the past two years and it was about to be blown up. Cloud nodded to Tifa as they drew closer. She unbuttoned her long coat and began unwinding the tangled mass of wires connecting the detonator to the dynamite.

Tifa was unafraid as she and Cloud approached. She had not feared losing anything in a long time. She had already lost nearly everything she had ever had worth losing. Her feelings were blank. In lieu of any perceptible emotion, she was thoughtful.

Tifa tried not to think too much about her "job" since leaving Nibelheim. She tried not to think too much about how this was all that mattered in her life: a bundle of detonators, explosives, and a man whom she suspected would not talk about that night in Costa Del Sol two years ago if his life depended on it. It was hard sometimes to tell with him. Sometimes Tifa suspected Cloud wanted to turn off his humanity. Tifa wanted hers back. She did not like thoughtful moments like this. The thoughts saddened her. Since she could never quench the thoughts, she could only quench the emotions.

She was becoming more and more like him.

Tifa heard a faint noise from above and every sense in her body tingled. "Cloud…" she whispered.

Cloud stopped. "What…"

Tifa surveyed the half-open windows overhead. She realized something about that was wrong less than a second before it happened. Cloud spun around in front of her as she saw the muzzle flash. He grunted and they heard the rifle pop. "Trap!"

Tifa threw her coat towards the building's brick façade. She pressed a button in her palm. Only one of the explosives had been properly wired. It kicked up brick and dust with a loud bang. The dust partly-covered their retreat as rifle shots became cacophonous.

Cloud threw aside his coat. The broad blade of his sword deflected another two bullets. They rounded the corner and Cloud jumped onto the motorcycle. Tifa leapt behind him and pressed her cheek to his back. Something was warm and wet. She touched her face and examined it. It was a deep red. As he activated the motorcycle and peeled out onto the road, she could see that a round had punctured his body armor. He was bleeding, but would not show the pain. He glanced over his shoulder. He could tell her more with a look than could anyone else. And with his look, Cloud was saying, "Snap out of it!"

Shinra soldiers mounted on motorcycles were approaching fast, increasing in number every block. Tifa pressed her hand to the headset. "Cid. It was a trap."

* * *

"C'mon. You think he's cute, don't you?" Jessie said.

Yuffie Kisaragi stopped flipping through her magazine. She peered over her shoulder into the driver's seat of the seventeen-year-old van that hadn't been vacuumed in about as many years. "The hair's a turnoff. Too retro punk."

"C'mon. If Cloud's not your type then who…"

Cid's vice crackled over the radio. "_Jessie. Yuffie. It was a trap._"

Jessie sat upright and grabbed the steering wheel. "Fuck. Where are Cloud and Tifa?"

"_Down Loveless Street__ with about a dozen Public Security goons on them._"

Jessie stammered. "Should we wait… should we…?"

"_Abort the mission! Get your asses back to the rendezvous point as fast as you can! Just don't draw attention to yourselves, whatever you do,_" Cid said.

Jessie watched the light in front of her turn red and spoke into her headset. "Dammit… Cait, can you do something about the traffic lights?"

"_I'm in the mainframe, but I don't want to draw any more attention to ourselves than we already have,_" Cait said.

When the light turned turned green, the blue car in front of her traveled ahead. A Shinra van burst through the stalled traffic from the other lane.

"Jessie!" Yuffie yelled.

Ten troopers marched out of the back of the van. They drew machine guns to bear. Within three seconds, bullets and blood littered the van's interior.

* * *

Monitors and equipment filled the back of the spacious trailer from floor to ceiling. At its center, Cid Highwind jostled his microphone. Biggs and Wedge looked on with concern. "Jessie?" Cid said. "Come in. Jessie?" he looked down at the mechanical cat who looked as concerned as a machine could look. "Yuffie?"

"_Yeah…_"

"Are you okay?"

"_I'm fine. Hiding. Jessie didn't make it._"

Cid swore. "Why didn't you pick anything up on the goddamn Public Safety frequencies, Cait?"

"There was nothing!" the mechanical cat said. "If they were communicating it had to have been over an encrypted frequency I don't know about!"

"_Cid?_" Yuffie said.

"What?"

"_Someone set us up,_" Yuffie said.

Cid glanced down at the mechanical cat for less than a second. "You know what you're saying, don't you?"

"_They came right to us. We didn't see them coming. They knew where we'd be!_"

"Don't worry about any of that now. Just get to safety."

"_When haven't I?_"

* * *

Tifa counted at least ten motorcycles on their tail. It was hard because they were moving so fast, dodging in and out of cars, between lanes. It was the center of the financial district mid-afternoon and the streets teemed with vibrant colors and motion and, increasingly, sounds of panic. Cloud weaved through an intersection as the light turned. A delivery truck squealed to a stop to their left, its brakes locking and its rear tires spinning out. Horns honked. A woman screamed. A man delivering a load of crates across the street to a produce stand dropped his freight and crawled out of the road. The Shinra motorcycles followed Cloud and Tifa through the clearing of vehicles. She barely heard the gunfire, but she saw the tracer rounds ricochet off the street ahead. Someone was going to get hurt or killed.

Tifa closed her eyes for a moment and forced herself to calm. A bright green road sign flashed overhead. "Cloud. The freeway on-ramp."

Cloud grunted his acknowledgement. Tifa disengaged from Cloud's warm, wet back and glanced down. Her white tank top was stained red. The blood from Cloud's back flowed more freely. He was still not in imminent danger. His expression remained blank, but he was distracted by the pain. Tifa could tell. No one else in the world had such a clear window into Cloud Strife's opaque soul.

Cloud eased off the throttle. The Shinra motorcycles drew closer. Tifa heard a round whistle past her ear. Cloud jerked the motorcycle into the on-ramp at the last possible moment. Two of the Shinra motorcycles thundered past, missing the ramp. The driver of one tried to overcorrect and flipped over the handles of his motorcycle, skidding across the pavement. The other motorcycles followed Cloud and Tifa. Cloud accelerated hard.

Tifa felt a gloved hand grasp at her bare shoulder. She could not see the Shinra soldier's eyes: only his clenched teeth. Tifa kicked him. He seesawed on his motorcycle but clasped her more tightly.

"Cloud…" Tifa said.

Cloud did not look back. "Do it."

Tifa hit a switch at the shoulder-mounted scabbard of Cloud's sword. She clasped the handle with two hands, locking her legs to the motorcycle as though her life depended on it, which it did. She pivoted and swung the heavy weapon. Its blade sliced a chunk out of the Shinra motorcycle. Its front half caved in. The driver's half-visible face froze in surprise when his own motorcycle flipped over his head. The remaining Shinra motorcycles slowed to avoid the scattering debris.

Cloud accelerated. Tifa resheathed the weapon. A gentle breeze carried fresh smells of evergreens and flowers from beyond the gates of Midgar onto the freeway. The fresh smells mingled with exhaust fumes and factory soot to create an uncanny smell, out of the whole world, unique to the surface plate of Midgar.

Tifa counted nine Shinra soldiers a ways behind them. Traffic was light, but Cloud still weaved between vehicles. Tifa pressed her headset. "Cid!"

"_Where are you two?_" Cid asked over the radio.

"On the freeway, Northeast bound."

"_Are they following you?_"

"Yeah…"

_"Lead them as far away from the rendezvous point as you can until you can lose them. Jessie… Jessie's gone."_

Tifa flinched. "What?"

Cloud glanced over his shoulder.

"_They found them and killed her,_" Cid said.

Tifa could not speak.

"_You there, Tifa?_" Cid said.

"Where's Yuffie?" Tifa said.

"_She's alive._" Cid said.

At least Tifa had only lost one friend today. So far, at least. She heard a gunshot from behind. It ricocheted off a blue truck to their right. The truck swerved and honked.

"We'll contact you when we're safe," Tifa said.

"_Roger that. Stay alive,_" Cid said.

"Yuffie?" Cloud said.

"Jessie," Tifa said.

Cloud was silent. He was, in general, a man of few words. "I can't figure out how we're going to make it out of this one alive," he finally said.

Tifa was not encouraged by that at all. "Keep trying."

Cloud scanned his surroundings. He pointed over the guardrail to their right. On the street below, a convoy of Shinra vehicles approached the highway onramp. Four motorcycles led an armored car and a nondescript prison truck.

"Great, more Public Security," Tifa said.

Cloud accelerated. The path behind them cleared. The motorcycles drifted closer at over two-hundred kilometers per hour. "I'm going towards them," he said.

Tifa blinked. "What?"

Cloud hooked wide across the five-lane road and made the sharpest, fastest, u-turn Tifa had ever seen. They were driving the wrong direction on the freeway at almost twice the speed limit. The Shinra vehicles turned and pursued. Behind them, Tifa heard a vehicle's horn followed by the shattering of glass. She thought it best not to look back. Cloud steered straight towards the onramp.

The next ten seconds or so were a flurry of motion and sound. The convoy was invisible until only a moment before it emerged around the guardrail below and then, they were upon it. The motorcycles appeared first, accelerating to merge onto the freeway, unaware of their presence. Cloud weaved between the motorcycles with finesse and circled around the remaining vehicles.

That's when Tifa heard the explosions.

The Shinra soldiers following them had not managed the same finesse.

* * *

Heideggar cursed into his PHS. "What do you mean 'AVALANCHE ambush?' What ambush? … They're where? … Why wasn't I told of this ambush? … I said that? … That was a long time ago. … Look, Corporal, I get a lot of e-mails every day…"

A motorcycle ripped the armored truck's cabin in half.

Aerith gasped and threw herself to the edge of the vehicle. She tried to shield her face, but was unable to for the handcuffs. The world turned itself upside down. Heideggar clung to the side of the vehicle opposite her. Sparks and the heat of flame pricked her face. The deafening noise physically hurt.

One of the Shinra guards was nowhere to be seen. Part of one of the other guard tumbled past. It felt like the end of the world. Suddenly she was on her side. The metal ceiling of the van was the only thing to cushion her fall and the impact knocked the wind out of her. Her vision blurred and grew dark.

* * *

"Turn around, Cloud!" Tifa yelled.

Cloud stopped the motorcycle and paused. He looked over his shoulder. "What did you just say?"

"I said turn around!"

The last of the motorcycles had demolished the last of the convoy. Behind them lay a smoldering, sparking mass of metal. Through that chaos, her eyes picked out the pink fabric and long, auburn hair out of place amidst the Shinra uniforms and gnarled vehicles.

"There's a civilian and she's hurt," Tifa said.

"Tifa, we don't have time for this. We're going… Dammit."

Tifa jumped off the motorcycle and ran towards the convoy. She ducked beneath a plume of black smoke and disappeared.

A green van rumbled towards Cloud along the now-vacant street corner. It was old and tired, puttering and jolting. Cloud dismounted from his motorcycle and drew his enormous sword. The vehicle jerked to a stop. Cloud watched the vehicle with wide eyes.

The door kicked open. The driver was still a teenager: younger than any member of AVALANCHE should have been. Cloud immediately recognized her short dark hair and deceptively gentle face.

"Yuffie," Cloud said.

"There you are, Cloud," Yuffie said.

"What are you doing here? How did you find us?"

Yuffie pointed to the van. "It was unlocked and easy to hotwire. I talked to Cid and he told me about where you were. Then I just followed the property damage. Where the hell's Tifa?"

Cloud waved to Tifa, prone by the young girl who had fallen out of the prison transport.

Yuffie scratched her head. "What's she doing?"

Cloud started to respond, but recognized a deep, pulsating noise. He looked into the southwestern sky. The helicopter drew closer by the second. "Tifa! Get back here now! Turks!"

Tifa looked up from her prone position by the destroyed caravan. She picked up the young woman, a slender thing in a pink dress and ribbon. The strange woman was injured and handcuffed. She was barely able to walk along with Tifa. They stumbled across the damaged onramp towards the van.

* * *

Tseng withdrew his binoculars. He shouted above the thunderous noise of the chopper blades. "They're still about four clicks out. We're not going to make it in time."

"What's all that mess?" Elena said.

"It looks like they caused some kind of accident," Tseng said. "I see Shinra vehicles. Can't tell much else. Get the rifles. Rude, take the chain gun."

Rude climbed into the door-mounted heavy weapon.

Reno grabbed a sniper rifle from the wall and checked the sight. "You don't think…"

"What?" Tseng said.

"You don't think that's that dumbass Heideggar's convoy to the Port of Junon, do you?" Reno said.

"Reno, don't be stupid," Elena said. "What kind of imbecile would let AVALANCHE attack his convoy all the while he's planning an ambush on them? Besides that,_ he's your boss._"

Reno shrugged. "I'm just sayin'."

"He could have timed it all better in any case," Rude said.

"Cut the chatter, boys and girls," Tseng said. "Get ready. They're almost in range."

"Get yourself a rifle, Newbie," Reno said.

Crimson eyes flashed at Reno. "I don't need one." The Turk with short black hair drew a three-barreled revolver.

* * *

Aerith drifted in and out of consciousness, but became more aware of the warm body supporting her and guiding her. She struggled to focus on the face at her side, dragging her forward by arm and hip. "What color are your eyes?" Aerith wanted to ask. They were a vivid burnished brown, almost red. She knew it was a strange thing to want to ask this stranger even before introductions and blamed her weariness. All Aerith knew was she had never been happier to see anyone in her entire life and she did not even know her name.

"Poor thing. What did they do to you?" the brunette with red-brown eyes whispered.

"Who…?"

"Tifa, hurry up," a male voice said.

"We're coming, Cloud," Tifa said.

Aerith saw the open back door of the van growing closer and closer. Aerith became more aware of her surroundings and a sense of unreality returned. The vehicle in which she had been riding before the accident had been reduced to scrap metal spread across a hundred meters behind her. She tried not to look at the bodies. She could see no trace of General Heideggar. She was not proud of wishing he were among the dead. The throbbing pain from the bruising on her face returned as her level of consciousness increased.

Cloud jumped into the back of the van. "Get in."

Aerith heard the sudden barrage of gunfire against the pavement and side of the van. It seemed almost as loud the exploding convoy. Tifa pulled Aerith into the van and then screamed. Aerith felt the jolt through her own body and then Tifa fell face first onto the van's floor.

Cloud pulled the door shut and turned Tifa onto her back. Panic filled his voice. "Yuffie! Go!"

Aerith sat upright and looked down at Tifa. She noticed for the first time that Tifa's shirt was drenched in blood. Some of it appeared old, already drying brown. Some was fresh and spreading outward from a triangular exit wound on her upper chest.

Tifa tucked in her chin to see the wound, shocked. Her head fell back, her eyes staring at the ceiling. Tears streamed down her face. With every breath came a click and a wheeze. Aerith could see it in her eyes: Tifa knew she was dying.

"Yuffie, do you have any materia?" Cloud said.

"No. It was in the van," Yuffie said.

"First aid?"

"I didn't plan for any of this, okay?"

Cloud rooted through his pockets. "We'll be back in Sector Seven in just a few minutes, okay, Tifa?"

Tifa coughed.

"Don't talk. Please…"

Cloud's face softened and Aerith noticed a striking youthfulness; almost a boyishness about his face. And then she saw his eyes and recognized the shimmering blue of Mako treatment. Yet, also in those eyes, she recognized vulnerability: a fear of losing a sister, mother, and lover in one.

"Tifa… hold on. You can't leave me," Aerith heard, whether the words were said or unsaid.

"Cut off my handcuffs," Aerith said.

Cloud turned.

"Cut off my handcuffs. I can help."

Cloud unsheathed his sword and brought it down to crush the handcuffs behind her back.

The van bumped and rumbled. Four or five bullets penetrated the rear door and exited through the side. The van turned so sharply, Aerith nearly fell on her side. It was a nightmare and she wanted only to awaken.

Tifa's breathing weakened. Aerith clasped her hands over Tifa's chest. Aerith became aware of her pain and carried it through her capillaries and veins to her own core. Their heartbeats synchronized. Aerith feared her own death, but more than that, she feared for Cloud who would be lost without her after all of these years. She was afraid, but prepared to relinquish her pain. There was far too much of that for her in life.

Aerith focused on their link. A cool glow filled the van. Wounds closed. Muscles fused. Bleeding stopped. Both women bathed in light.

More than death, Tifa Lockhart now feared life.

* * *

Cid Highwind and Cait Sith sat quietly. Biggs and Wedge spoke in infrequent whispers, afraid to penetrate the thick silence. There had been no communication in about ten minutes.

A staticky voice crackled through the radio. "_Hello?_"

Cid jumped upright. "Tifa? That you?"

"_It's Yuffie. We're in the clear for now. Don't ask me how I do it_."

"The Turks?" Cid said.

"_We lost them for now. Give us a few hours. We'd better head straight to Sector Seven through a back way. Meet you back home?_"

"Sounds good, Yuffie. Is everyone okay?"

"_Surprisingly… yeah… There's this girl…_"

"Girl?"

"_Long story. I think Barret's going to want to meet her._"

"Alright. We'll talk later. Good job. Over and out."

"They're alive?" Cait Sith sounded ecstatic.

"Yeah…" Cid said. "They're alive."

* * *

Tifa leaned against the side of the van, resting; cowering. She inhaled a healthy, unlabored breath and stroked the place on her upper chest that had not long before been shattered bone and gristle. "What did you do to me?"

They were parked in a narrow alleyway, a camouflaged tarp thrown over the vehicle. The cabin was all but pitch black if not for a dim flashlight. Aerith looked up at Tifa. Through the dim light, it was apparent the bruising on her face was healed. "It's something I've always been able to do," Aerith said. "It's just a bit… tiring. " Aerith looked at Cloud. "You were hurt too," she said.

Cloud stiffened and glanced at Tifa. The blood on the makeshift dressing across his chest and back was drying. "It wasn't bad. I've already started to heal."

Of course. He was a SOLDIER.

The thousand thoughts in Tifa's head slowed little by little and she became more and more aware of which ones were not her own. A familiar face resonated through her mind. It had eyes as blue as Cloud's, but a more mature, sculpted shape. Her eyes met Aerith.

Cloud himself remained silent, aloof ever since Tifa awakened with fading bruising and little else.

"So you're AVALANCHE," Aerith said.

Cloud and Tifa looked at each other.

"How did you know where to find me?" Aerith said.

"We have our ways," Cloud said. "You mean a lot to Shinra."

Tifa did a double-take. He had not missed a beat.

"I want to talk to all of you," Aerith said. "I have something I need to tell someone."

"What?" Cloud said.

Aerith looked down and shook her head.

No one spoke again for about an hour until they began to move.

* * *

"We put out an All Public Security Bulletin to find and stop the shittiest van in Midgar and we still haven't found them," Reno said.

Elena rolled her eyes. "If we'd been a little closer, we could have stopped them. How can we help it if we don't hear a damn thing about it until there's a firefight on the freeway and have to fly all the way from Shinra tower?"

Rude looked up from his headset. "We just got a report from the second platoon. General Heideggar's been recovered. He was injured under some rubble. He'll be okay."

"Heideggar's fucked," Reno said. "That was definitely the Cetra who got into the van with AVALANCHE."

"Let the president deal with General Heideggar," Tseng said. "I'll take responsibility for losing AVALANCHE. You all did well considering. And we even managed to take one of them out." He turned to the newest Turk. "One shot with a pistol at long range. I've never seen anything like it. Nice shooting, Valentine."

Vincent looked up from his corner of the chopper and smirked.


	3. Chapter 3: Masamune

**3**

**Masamune**

Tseng thought the blond receptionist was cute in a bookish sort of way. He always had. It was something about her glasses and slick, bobby-pinned bangs. He had never talked to her and had chalked it up to seeing her only briefly when he passed by the executive office.

He had been waiting outside of the executive office for over an hour now and she had not so much as looked at him. Her beautiful blue eyes remained fixed on her computer monitor as she typed. He had always had any woman he wanted. Until now. Tseng found it all depressing.

Tseng crossed his legs. "So I heard you were out sick the night Sephiroth attacked, Ms. Trepe…"

No answer—only typing.

Tseng uncrossed his legs and sighed.

A loud bump resonated through the thick doors to the office. Voices rose. One in particular was so loud and shrill, Tseng would have never guessed it belonged to a morbidly obese man if not for its distinctive tenor.

The doors flew open with violence. Tseng jumped. Four Shinra guards dragged General Heideggar away. He grasped at the door frame and chairs, throwing up his legs and kicking. "Tseng! For the love of all that's holy, stop them! Please! Make him see reason! Don't let him do this to me! He can't! Save me!"

The soldiers dragged Heideggar down the hall. The elevator door closed behind them. Heideggar's voice faded after descending several floors.

The receptionist did not look up. "President Shinra will see you now."

Tseng passed through the still-open door.

At his desk, Rufus poured a drink from a crystal decanter into a snifter. "General Heideggar just tendered his resignation."

The doors closed behind Tseng. He took in a silent deep breath and approached. A sword rested across Rufus' desk—curved and viciously sharp; longer than he was. When Tseng had last seen the weapon a week before, it had been impaled into that very desk, through a man. It was the Masamune.

Rufus sipped his drink. "Let me make this perfectly clear, Tseng. I tolerate incompetence far less than my father."

Tseng took his eyes away from the weapon. "Of course, Mr. President."

"So tell me exactly why AVALANCHE escaped. You had the Turks. Your men and women are supposed to be the elite among the elite. Are you trying to tell me that wasn't good enough to take care of an ex-SOLDIER Third Class and a group of common terrorists?"

"Sir, we had five minutes notice to board a chopper and manage an incident ten kilometers away. If we had been on standby, interdiction would have been easy."

"Are you blaming General Heideggar?"

"No, Mr. President. I'm only saying it was a long-shot to begin with." But then, Rufus Shinra had already read the report, had he not?

"How were they able to escape a helicopter with an old van through heavy traffic?" Rufus said.

"The streets gave them cover and they seemed to know them pretty well. And the van's driver, the Wutainese shinobi, had a thermal camouflaged tarp."

"Why didn't our plant in AVALANCHE tell us she had this tarp?"

"Because he didn't know. The Wutainese girl doesn't trust anyone."

A faint smile cracked Rufus' lips. Tseng allowed himself to relax, if only a little. He had answered the questions to which Rufus already knew the answers with satisfaction. "We're vetting a new head of Public Safety. In the meantime, I will be taking personal control of the search for the Cetra and the operation against Sephiroth. Sit down, Tseng. Please."

Tseng sat opposite Rufus, the long weapon between them. "Sir."

"I want the Turks to devote all of their resources to recovering the Cetra. I still think she holds the key to this whole debacle. Maybe literally. And I want to solve this AVALANCHE problem once and for all. There haven't been any sightings of Sephiroth in days."

"Right…"

"Do you have any thoughts, Tseng?"

"Only that we have that plant in AVALANCHE."

"What if we were to recall him… and he were able to kidnap the Cetra and bring her to the surface."

"There's only one problem. It might prove harder than expected to get her out of Sector Seven. No where in the world are there more thieves, murderers, and scoundrels in one place. Few Shinra personnel have ever made it in there alive and of those, none have ever made it out in one piece."

"All the more reason to try. I don't think any Shinra informant has been in there so deep for so long before. And what in Sector Seven is actually of use to us other than the Cetra and our man? Is there anything in there at all down there the world couldn't do without?" Tseng did not like Rufus' smile at all.

"My thought is we wait it out. A week and no longer. I'd put money on it. And I think I know exactly where she'll go."

Rufus gave Tseng a hard look. "Would you care for a drink?"

"No… thank you, Mr. President."

"Pity. The grapes were harvested in Nibelheim. Before the incident, of course. It's an inhospitable climate, but grapes make the best brandy when they have to struggle to survive. Have you ever been?"

"I'm afraid not," Tseng said. "There wasn't much there other than the reactor. I never had a reason to visit the Jenova excavation site. Your father wanted SOLDIER to have jurisdiction."

Rufus sipped his brandy. "Were you familiar with the SOLDIERs he sent?"

"A little. Cloud Strife had just been activated before the incident. I didn't really know him. Everyone knew General Sephiroth. Zack… He was like the last of the old guard. Noble. Friendly. He reminded you that being a SOLDIER meant something. It wasn't just a job for him. I liked Zack. I suppose I considered him a friend."

Rufus touched the Masamune. "You haven't asked me what I'm doing with this yet… the weapon that killed my father."

"I thought you'd tell me if it was important."

Rufus smiled. "I didn't know many of the SOLDIERS. My father had me traveling around all the time. Tell me a little bit about General Sephiroth. As he was."

"General Sephiroth. He was complicated. He was even-tempered… generally speaking. Misunderstood."

"How do you mean?"

"He came across as cold. He didn't have many friends, even within SOLDIER, but he was a good man and a good leader. He didn't talk about himself much, but… he fought in the Wutainese uprising six years ago. That was a hard campaign. I think he saw some _things_. I think you know what I'm talking about."

"Right."

"Also, he did not like your father at all."

Rufus chuckled. "Maybe we would have gotten along after all."

The question at the edge of Tseng's mind for a week bubbled to the surface and could not be repressed. "What did General Sephiroth find in Nibelheim anyway?"

"What indeed…"

* * *

The voices spoke in a language without words or sound. She recognized them as thoughts, ideas, feelings that were not her own. As she stepped out of the van in Sector Seven, she caught one in the wind; a vague feeling of longing. The voices had been part of her for as long as she could remember. She felt hollow and alone in their absence. In Shinra Tower, the voices—the ever-present background noise—had been so faint as to be inaudible.

They called out to no one in particular: anyone who could hear. Aerith had never left Midgar, but yearned to someday seek out the most distant of them. As she aged, she became aware of their growing in desperation. What had been soft sentiments and ideas over years became a frantic crescendo: wordless voices screaming, "Save me."

And then on a cool night two years ago, the urgency of those wordless voices stopped. Aerith sometimes wondered: had those frantic voices died? Or had their savior come?

The slums of Sector Seven were dirty and soot-filled and all but bereft of light. She had found the Sector Five slums depressing. At least every building as far as the eye could see in Sector Five had not been constructed from plywood and scrap metal. Still, in that moment, that did not seem to matter. With the return of the voices, Aerith felt reinvigorated; reconnected to the world.

She felt as though she had risen from the dead.

Cloud rubbed his shoulder. "That was some pot-hole back there, Yuffie."

"Where did you learn how to drive again?" Tifa said.

"Keep it up, Boobs," Yuffie said.

Tifa blushed.

Aerith could see surprisingly little through the iridescent green street lights. "Where are we?"

"Home," Tifa said.

Aerith squinted to read the sign high above the building in front of them. "'Texas?'"

"No," Tifa said. "The sign was free. But no one liked that name. We call it Seventh Heaven. It's my other job."

"And an important place for all of us," Cloud said.

Aerith nearly stepped on a kitten on the steps. It hissed and ran. "You're certainly letting me in on a lot. Since we just met."

"It's an open secret," Tifa said. "Shinra knows who we are. They could find us easily. Getting us would be the tough part."

"So aren't you afraid of someone selling you out?" Aerith said.

"Shinra's not that popular here, you know," Yuffie said. "You think anyone actually likes living in this shithole? Besides. If someone tried saying something to Shinra, they know we'd kill them."

Aerith froze.

"Yuffie," Tifa said. "Stop that. She saved my life. And you're scaring her."

Yuffie shrugged again and walked through the door.

Aerith was blind to the darkness inside. The smell of stale beer alone gave away the purpose of the building. The outline of a person emerged from behind the bar.

"Is she a new friend, Auntie Tifa?" a small voice said.

Aerith's eyes adjusted. She struggled to believe what she saw.

"A Long Island Iced Tea? You look like you could use a fruity drink," the girl behind the bar said.

"How old are you, little girl?" Aerith said.

"Four and a half."

Tifa sat at the bar at the girl's eye level. Aerith detected irritation in her voice. "This is Aerith, Marlene. Is Barret downstairs?"

"He is. So are Biggs and Wedge and Cait Sith and Cid and Red. Where's Auntie Jessie?"

"She got caught in traffic." Yuffie did not even blink.

"Oh," Marlene said.

Tifa ruffled the girl's hair. She approached a pinball machine in the back of the bar, pushed a button and banged it. As the tilt light lit, it shifted away to reveal an elevator.

Tifa, Cloud, Aerith, and Yuffie stepped in. The lights flickered as they descended. When the door opened again, they were in a small room about the size of the small bar above.

A heavyset young man was the first to stand. A more slender companion joined a moment later. "Cloud! Tifa! Yuffie!" the heavyset one said.

"Wedge, Biggs," Tifa said.

"We thought you were dead for sure!" Wedge said.

"We don't know what we'd do without you!" Biggs said.

A stocky man with dark skin sat at a desk at the center of the room. He looked up only for a moment when they arrived. His eyes lingered on Aerith and he scowled. At his side were a grim-looking smoker and a mechanical black cat.

"Tifa!" the mechanical cat said.

Cloud rolled his eyes.

"Marlene's alone upstairs, Barret" Tifa said.

Barret tapped a computer monitor in front if him. Aerith noticed his primitive mechanical arm. The monitor showed the room upstairs. Marlene sat on the floor behind the bar, playing with a moogle doll.

Tifa did not seem placated. "Aerith, this is Barret Wallace, Cid Highwind, and Cait Sith. This is Biggs, and this is Wedge." Although they had worked together for several months, Tifa could never quite remember their last names. "This is the girl I was telling you about, Cid."

"You're the girl Shinra wants," Barret said.

Aerith fixed her attention on the mechanical cat. It was petting a red-hued cat—a living, breathing one. It was still little more than a kitten, no bigger than its companion. It was injured: a scar across its right eye. Aerith heard her name and nodded to Barret.

Cid pulled over several chairs and the new arrivals sat. Cloud sat furthest away. Aerith watched him remove his armor and undershirt. Biggs removed the blood-soaked bandaging over his wound. Aerith quickly looked away from his broad chest, but not before noticing the absence of fresh blood on the dressing. He had been a SOLDIER. She would have known even if she had not plucked that knowledge straight out of Tifa's brain.

Barret procured an unidentifiable bottle of liquor from under his desk. Cloud and Tifa took a glass. Aerith declined. She related her capture in front of the Cathedral where she sold flowers and as much as she cared to disclose about her interrogation: the week of not knowing when or how she would be free; whether it was day or night; knowing she could lie and be free, but not even knowing what would make a plausible lie. Tifa avoided eye contact as she spoke. Aerith appreciated that.

"The hell did they want to know after all of that?" Barret said.

Aerith sighed. "Something about… about Nibelheim. They kept calling me 'Ancient' or 'Cetra.' And they talked a lot about something called Jenova..."

Aerith heard the screech of metal against the hard cement floor. She looked across the room to see Cloud perched on the edge of his chair. The others in the room listened with silent, calm attention. Except for Tifa. Tifa looked frightened.

"What?" Aerith said.

Cloud cupped his face in his hands. "It's Sephiroth. He's still alive, isn't he?"

Aerith hesitated. "Who's Sephiroth?"

* * *

Rufus awoke to a cool night breeze. He never left his penthouse windows open. Never. He threw aside his sheets and sat upright. He reached for the panic button by his nightstand. The guards had to be patrolling the hall.

There was no panic button—only a severed cord by his nightlight where one had been.

"You did not honestly think I would not come back for this, did you? Audacious to keep it by your own nightstand. You are very much like your father, Rufus Shinra."

Rufus did not immediately recognize the rumbling voice, but he recognized the flittering silver hair. When the silhouette turned, he saw its gleaming eyes: not the mako-infused blue of a common SOLDIER. These eyes were pale green: close to the color of mako itself. He held his reclaimed sword in his left hand.

"General Sephiroth, I presume. Or is it Jenova?"

"Do you wish to know how your father died?"

Rufus noticed the distance between himself and his telephone. "Enlighten me."

"I broke his bones. He cursed me. Then he screamed. Then he cried for your grandmother. Then I removed his extremities. Fingers. Toes. Other unnecessary parts. When the pain grew so intense he could no longer feel, I ceased to find pleasure in the process. Only then did I finish him."

"Wish I could have been there."

The silhouette spun around. Though its eyes were a color like those of the Cetra girl, nothing human had slits for pupils like the thing before Rufus. Human or not, it seemed almost taken aback by Rufus' remark.

Rufus lunged for his telephone. A black shadow flashed across the room. Rufus' hands were pinned to the dresser by glimmering steel, pierced through so cleanly the pain did not come for seconds. When the pain finally came, it was unreal.

"Where is the Black Materia?" Sephiroth growled.

Fighting the urge to scream out from the pain took more willpower than Rufus had ever mustered. "Fuck you."

"Where is it? It is not where it should be. Someone has moved it."

"And what makes you think I know anything about it?"

Sephiroth twisted the sword. Rufus screamed. After a minute, he heard rumbling outside his door. The Shinra guards tried to open the door but could not. Sephiroth had trapped him.

"I will make you know suffering the likes of which you have never experienced," Sephiroth said.

"If so, get it over with, alright?"

"Your father would not tell me what I needed to know."

"Neither will I. I don't know it."

Sephiroth withdrew the sword from Rufus' hands. An invisible force grasped Rufus by the throat and chest. He flew across his room. The frigid night air high above Midgar pricked his fingers and toes. Immediately to his right stood Shinra tower. Ahead was the open window of his apartment. He was looking inside.

Sephiroth hovered into the open sky; nose to nose before Rufus. "Tell me where the Black Materia is or I will kill you."

"If you're going to do it, just do it and get it over with," Rufus said. "I don't have all night."

Sephiroth's cat-like eyes narrowed. Rufus felt a rush of wind. His stomach dropped from the motion. Then he slammed hard against his bedroom wall. He hit the floor. His dinner from five hours before followed a second later.

Sephiroth hovered outside. "I will not kill you now, Rufus Shinra. I want you to be alive and alert while you watch me burn your world to the ground."

Rufus' bedroom door opened. Guards stumbled in and scrambled to tend to Rufus' injuries. They searched for signs of the intruder, but he was nowhere to be seen.

A few days later, Rufus began to miss the sword. After hearing about his father's death, he wanted it as momento more than ever. Somewhere in the silver-haired husk of his visitor, he was convinced General Sephiroth still lived.

And he was an artist.


	4. Chapter 4: Loveless

**4**

**Loveless**

Aerith could not sleep. Her room above Seventh Heaven was surprisingly spacious, but her mind was too much abuzz with the familiar swarms of foreign thoughts and ideas. She had always suspected as much, but now she was sure: the voices liked talking to her.

They had missed her.

Tifa's voice rose downstairs. "That's not the point, Barret!"

"Next week, we'll hit another soft target or two and then maybe they'll take their eyes off the reactors: the mother load," Barret said.

"They got One and Five back online within weeks. We could never hit them faster than they could fix them. And why would they take their eyes off of them?"

"We just have to be damn persistent. You know what's at stake, Tifa. Remember Gongaga? Shit, I could talk all day about goddamn Corel!"

"Barret…"

"You know those Mako reactors are killing the planet and Midgar's mother-fucking public enemy number one."

"Barret…"

"And after you and Cloud told me what Shinra did to Nibelheim…"

"Barret. Listen to me. She needs a home. She needs a father."

Aerith descended the stairs and heard Barret sigh.

"I know," he said. "I know, alright? But if we don't do this, who will? And what kinda world will Marlene even have that's worth living in? I don't see you waving a damn 'peace' sign in the air, Tifa. Back at Reactor One, you were as cold as that man of yours…"

"He's not my man, Barret."

"My point is: you can dish it out better than him. Did you stop and think how many of those people who died in the blast must've been just everyday nine-to-five Joes tryin' to make a living?"

"I know. I'm a hypocrite. I get it already. But this isn't about me."

"All I'm saying is this is the life we're living. I know it. You know it. Marlene knows it."

"Dammit Barret…"

"Yuffie's convinced someone sold us out. What do you think?"

"You're changing the subject."

"You're goddamn right I'm changing the subject. This is important."

Tifa sighed. "Someone tipped off Shinra. I'm sure of it."

"Wedge, Biggs and Jessie are the newest. Like hell it was Jessie. Biggs is a space cadet, but Wedge... I just can't get a feel for him."

Tifa sounded exasperated. "I don't want to think it was an inside job."

"I'll take Cid and Cloud out tomorrow. We'll shake down Don Corneo. If it wasn't an inside job, he'll know something."

"Great."

"Great?"

Aerith stood at the base of the steps. Through the cracked door, she saw Tifa throw up her arms.

"Did a single word I just said sink in with you?" Tifa said.

Barret glowered. "Wouldn't matter if it did. Look, you be nice to that girl Shinra's looking for. She might be useful."

"Uh huh."

"I'm going downstairs for a while. Be a dear and cut off the light when you go back upstairs."

Barret approached the pinball table and jostled it to reveal the secret elevator. He vanished behind the closing doors. Tifa leaned against the bar. Few times had Aerith ever seen such a dark look on another woman. And then Tifa caught her eye. Aerith retreated, warded back by the intensity of Tifa's glare, but then the burning embers of her fire-red eyes cooled.

She had been discovered, but she did not care. Tifa laughed, but it was a sad laugh. "This isn't the life I wanted."

Aerith opened her mouth to speak, but stopped herself.

Tifa's lips twisted into a smile. "You can go ahead and say it."

"Say what?"

"'I know.'"

Aerith returned Tifa's sad smile. "I know. I know it's not the life you wanted."

Tifa leaned against the bar. Her voice was weak; vulnerable. "So tell me… What _did_ you do to me?"

"In the van?"

Tifa nodded.

"For as long as I remember, I've had this power. I've been able to draw on energy all around to heal. I can heal others as well… but first I have to intensify our link. For only a moment, our minds and bodies almost became one."

"'Intensify?' You make it sound like it's something that's already there. Here we are though. I've never met you before in my life, but I feel like I know you. From somewhere long before."

Aerith shrugged, aware that what she was about to say could not help but sound silly. "We're all connected through the Lifestream, Tifa. We just discovered that we've always known each other somehow."

Tifa threw her head back and stifled a chuckle. "Barret gets me too fired up. Want some coffee?"

* * *

"Cloud and I were going to see that tomorrow," Tifa said.

Aerith tilted her head. "What?"

Tifa pointed to the billboard above them and to their left as they walked. "Loveless. It's supposed to be really good. Whenever he and Cid and Barret go out together, it takes all day. I guess it just wasn't in the cards." She sighed. "You're not tired?"

"I've been stuck in a jail cell for about a week. I'm just glad to be out."

Tifa and Aerith waded through a buzzing crowd along the surface plate: a pair of anonymous faces among hundreds of anonymous faces. It was after midnight, but almost as bright as day for the street lights and neon signs.

"Don't you worry about being seen?" Aerith said.

"Not too much," Tifa said. "There are over ten million people in Midgar. I don't think they've ever gotten a positive ID on me. Cloud's the only one whose picture they show on television. He wears his shades to be careful, but do you know how many young men here have that hairstyle?" She paused at Aerith's bemusement. "Well… more than you'd think."

"I seldom left Sector Five. I've lived there with my mom since I was little."

"Your mom?"

"She's not my real mom. I'm an orphan. I don't remember a lot about my birth parents. Maybe Shinra's right. Maybe I am a Cetra."

"You think the Ancients still really exist?" Tifa said.

"Who knows?" Aerith sipped her coffee. "Since I was little, I've always known I was different somehow. My father… that is to say, my foster father… he died when I was very young. He fought in the campaigns against Wutai. On the night he was killed, I _heard_ him. I told my mom not to be sad. He had returned to the Lifestream. I don't think she understood, but she grew to accept I was different. I miss her. I haven't seen her in a week."

"If Shinra's really looking for you and they knew how to find you, I'm sure that'll be the first place they look for you."

"Yeah. I know."

"May I help you ladies?" a small, familiar voice said.

Tifa and Aerith stopped at a street corner. The mechanical cat almost went unnoticed on account ofthe big, fat mechanical moogle upon which it rested. It winked. At least Tifa thought it winked. Its eyes were narrow slits as it was.

"Cait! What are you doing here?" Tifa said.

"Working." The cat shifted against the moogle's head, leaning against an ear. "What brings you ladies out all the way up here so late?"

"We couldn't sleep," Tifa said. "I needed some more air."

The cat "hmmed." Its expression remained unreadable. "Perhaps a fortune, on the house, for our newfound friend? What would you say, ma'am?"

Aerith giggled. "It sounds like fun. I haven't had my fortune read in years."

"Alright then!" The mechanical cat cracked its knuckles, or at least would have had it had cartilage to crack. The white moogle began to gyrate to and fro, rocking and bucking, throwing its arms and hips. When it came to a stop, a tiny piece of paper exited its mouth.

Aerith took the paper and winced. "'When it comes to love, you don't have much luck.'"

The cat recoiled. "Ooh… I'm sorry. If it makes you feel any better, I'm the same way."

"By the way, I never got around to thanking you all properly for the other day…"

The cat shushed her. "Tsk tsk. Don't worry. We shouldn't talk about those things up here." He eyed a curious onlooker behind Tifa and Aerith. "If you'll excuse me, I should work, but it was nice running into you two."

Aerith and Tifa said final farewells and walked on.

"What _is_ that?" Aerith said when she thought she was out of earshot.

"We call him Cait Sith," Tifa said. "Of course it's just a robot controlled remotely. He won't tell us his real name. Or where he is. All we know is that he's a skilled hacker and he hates Shinra as much as all of us."

"You don't know him but you trust him?"

Tifa smiled. "I trust him."

"Tell me more about my new 'friends,'" Aerith said.

"Cid was a scientist. He worked with Shinra's space program before they scrapped his project. When he asked around and looked into it, he came across some dirty secrets. It seems Shinra's known for years that Mako power is destroying the planet. Vegetation across Gaia isn't growing like it used to. People who live near some of the older reactors are more prone to all types of cancer. Shinra was using its space program to look for alternate sources of mako. They finally decided to give up. Barret can be a real piece of work… but he has reason to hate Shinra after what they did to Corel. Yuffie…"

"She seems like a feisty one."

"She is… but don't think she isn't complicated. She survived the Wutai massacre when she was only nine. Sometimes she cries in her sleep…"

"And Cloud?"

"We'll talk about _him_ some other time," Tifa said. "I got that same damn fortune from Cait Sith a few months ago."

Aerith smiled. "He certainly does seem to have accurate predictions…"

Tifa's face tightened. "Zack Fair…"

Aerith turned. Her eyes were widened. Her lower lip trembled.

"You knew him… didn't you?" Tifa said.

"So you did meet him," Aerith said. "I thought I was seeing my consciousness reflected in yours that time."

"He was one of the three SOLDIERs sent to Nibelheim," Tifa said. "He and Cloud were friends. I only knew him for a short time. He helped save my life."

"He was my boyfriend."

"I'm sorry…"

"Tell me. He never told me where he went. What he was doing. He couldn't. It was a secret."

Tifa's voice lowered. "We shouldn't talk about that right here and now. Let's head home."

* * *

Cloud had been up. Occasional shuffling in his room across the hall proved that. Tifa and Aerith talked as they prepared for bed, becoming more and more accustomed to their status as well-acquainted strangers. Their first encounter had been frightening, but Aerith was a gentle soul. Of that, Tifa was certain

"He's still up," Aerith said. "And I'm sure he'd love to talk to you."

"You don't know the story between us?" Tifa said.

"No," Aerith said. "Your mind was all over the place, but I couldn't tell that."

Tifa's face reflected something like satisfaction. "Something I actually have to tell you about myself sometime. Good."

Aerith draped her sheets over her legs and leaned against her pillow. Tifa sat at the foot of her bed and spoke.

"For years, archeologists wandered in and out of the mountains. We all knew there was something there. There were little relics. Folktales. When they said they'd found evidence that Nibelheim was the site of an Ancient ruin, no one was too surprised. And then Professor Hojo came.

"He was an odd man. No one really understood him. He set up shop in an old mansion on the outskirts of town. They said he worked for Shinra, but no one really talked to him. Whenever he came into town, he just sort of stared at us. He talked to himself a lot. I was still young. My father made me stay away from him. He was more than a little creepy. But it seemed like he was spending a lot of time at the ruins in the mountains. It wasn't far from the Shinra mako reactor."

Tifa paused. "Cloud and I grew up together, Aerith. He's also from Nibelheim. He was a friend, in a roundabout way. But my father didn't like him. One night, he found me and took me away to the town well and told me he was leaving and he wouldn't come back until he became a SOLDIER.

"I tried to contact him in Midgar, but I couldn't. I don't think he wanted me to. But one day about two years ago, he called me. He said he and two other SOLDIERs were on their way with a platoon of Shinra troops. He said he'd heard that I was a good guide. I spent most of my time in the mountains training so I knew them pretty well. So, before I even really had time to accept that he was on his way back into my life, there he was, with an armed escort.

"Sometimes you care for a person because of the way they are and sometimes you care for a person because of what you think they could be. I liked Cloud just the way he was. But seeing him come back as a SOLDIER… it was like there was a wall between us. And only I could see it. He couldn't tell me what they were doing. He couldn't tell me what they wanted." Tifa flopped down onto the bed. "He wasn't my Cloud anymore. He was Shinra's Cloud.

"But that's where I met Zack. He was a charming guy and I wish I'd known him longer. It was kind of funny. He seemed so nice… more real with me."

"What happened to Zack?" Aerith said.

Tifa collected her thoughts. "We started out early the next morning. Cloud and Zack and I, Professor Hojo, a bunch of Shinra troops, and General Sephiroth. Sephiroth was a SOLDIER First Class and he was the team leader. We went deep into the mountain. It was a place I'd never been. It had been declared off limits by Shinra. I had to wait outside.

"After a little while, I heard voices and then I heard yelling and banging. So I went in. The Shinra troops didn't stop me. I saw Zack and Cloud, and General Sephiroth all scattered along the inside of the cave. They were near this… chamber. I don't know how else to describe it. There were machines and there was technology like I'd never seen before.

"Something terrible had happened there. I could see signs of fresh destruction. Zack and Cloud were injured on the ground. Hojo was against a wall. I saw General Sephiroth standing over this… I don't know what it was. It was some kind of thing. Its flesh was pale blue and watery, like something washed up from the ocean floor. Parts of it were still moving, but it looked like it had exploded. General Sephiroth crouched over it and then…" Tifa stopped. There was fresh fear in her eyes.

"What?" Aerith said.

Tifa shook her head. "General Sephiroth attacked us. We went crazy. It was like… something had possessed him. The Shinra troops came in after. Sephiroth killed everyone. He nearly killed me."

"Everyone?" Aerith said.

"We made it to the outer cave and then I heard Zack say…" She swallowed. "'We have to run…" Tifa's eyes narrowed—burned with hatred. "We watched from the cliffside. They tried to kill Sephiroth. There was artillery fire. They bombarded Nibelheim with Sephiroth at its center. They wiped it off the face of Gaia."

Aerith could not speak for a moment. "The news said the reactor malfunctioned…"

"Lies. They destroyed my home. They killed everyone in it to kill Sephiroth. Or whatever he became. I could count the survivors on one hand."

Aerith waited. "During all of this… Zack…?"

"We made our way to the coast, but most of it was on foot. We avoided any sign of Shinra like the plague. It was a long journey. I never received real medical treatment for… what happened." Tifa clutched her chest. She looked deep into Aerith's eyes. "We ran into some trouble on the way. Zack died saving us, Aerith. He was a hero."

Aerith smiled a wistful smile. "Thanks for saying that, Tifa. But I don't need pretty little lies. I already know the truth about _that_."

Tifa turned white. "You do?"

"I know he took his own life in Costa Del Sol two weeks after Nibelheim."

Tifa did not speak.

"Well… Goodnight."

* * *

A/N: So that's all I've pre-written before I started posting. I'll upload more as I write.


	5. Chapter 5: The Flower Girl

**5**

**The Flower Girl**

Fire. Chaos. Screams. Death.

Mideel burned in the night. And at its center, a pale figure in black stood. Silver hair glistened and a single black wing glimmered in the crimson glow.

The figure turned. Its eyes were a pale green: so much like her own. He was like her in his connection to the Lifestream; unlike her in his inhumanity.

She was not there. She was seeing it all from afar. And yet, he saw her.

"You…" Sephiroth said.

* * *

Aerith awoke in a sweat. It was still dark. It was still night. The voices of the planet were eerily silent. A disgusting knot churned in her stomach.

She ran to the bathroom and threw up.

She tried telling herself it was nothing—only a dream. Regardless, at her core, she knew something horrible had happened.

The hours passed. Sleep never returned. Shortly before the crack of dawn, she made her way to the bathroom down the hall and showered. She could scrub away the grime and dirt from her previous day in Sector Seven. She could not scrub away the disgust and homesickness.

Refreshed if not reinvigorated, she dried herself and opened the door, robed but otherwise bare. Tifa stood in front of her in her nightgown, startled. She glanced across Aerith's face and body bemused but otherwise unreadable.

Finally, Tifa spoke. "So how do you get your hair to do that anyway?"

* * *

Over the days since her arrival, Aerith gathered that Tifa, the consummate tomboy, had never had a real girl friend before. She soon realized more than that fueled Tifa's fascination with Aerith. Tifa was a motherless child. For all of Aerith's girlishness, she may as well have been from another world. The goddess had given Tifa beauty—of that there could be no question. It was ironic that beauty had befallen a girl who held it in such disregard. She adorned herself without fuss. Aerith realized she did not mean for the pairing of tank top with suspenders and short skirt she often wore to be scandalous. Even in the big city, she was just a poor country girl and dressed the part. She seemed half oblivious to her effect on men. The effect would have been greater still had scars not marred her otherwise flawless complexion.

And those were only the scars Aerith could see.

Aerith examined her lipstick. "Well… when selling flowers one must look the part."

"No one's ever said anything to me about makeup at Seventh Heaven," Tifa, who wore no makeup, said.

"Well… flowers are all about appearance, Tifa. Working at a bar…"

"Some men aren't in a place to notice those things," Tifa said.

"Our job sites might make a fine 'before and after' for some men. They buy the flowers to impress in the morning…"

"And by the evening, they're drinking away their sorrows." Tifa smirked. "You'd be surprised what I have to do sometimes, Aerith."

"Oh?"

"Well… I see some men and women at their most vulnerable. Often times they're drunk and frail on top of being deeply hurt inside. And sometimes… sometimes what they really need is someone to talk to. Someone to offer reassurance and comfort. And sometimes they don't have anyone else in their lives to offer it."

Aerith paused and turned away from her mirror. "I hope you know I was just teasing…"

"I know."

Aerith tied her hair with a bow and strung the pearly white-stoned necklace around her neck. She would have known it by now even if not for the brief connecting of their minds a week before: Tifa was a natural caretaker.

"I… have a confession to make," Tifa said.

Aerith turned.

"When we found you? We didn't really know Shinra was transporting a valuable prisoner. It was a complete accident."

Aerith giggled. "I kind of figured that out by now."

"Yeah…"

"I was still a little bit afraid of AVALANCHE when you found me. But thank you. For not making me feel used. It's not home… but this has been nice."

Tifa reacted to the sadness behind Aerith's eyes.

"What's for breakfast this morning?" Aerith said.

"I was thinking pancakes," Tifa said.

"I'll help."

They descended the stairs. "Is something bothering you this morning?" Tifa said.

Aerith shook her head. "I had a bad dream last night that's all.

They turned around the corner and that was when the horror of the night before pierced Aerith's heart.

All of AVALANCHE sat around a compact television placed on the bar. The reporter stood in front of an enormous crater. The ticker at the bottom of the screen identified the otherwise unidentifiable location.

Mideel had been an idyllic travel getaway. Now, buildings and bridges smoldered. Even through the dawn light, burning red embers and the green glow of mako leaking from the earth cast muddled light on frantic passers-by. There were firefighters and Shinra medics. The firefighters were more hurried than the medics. Fire still burned, but no wounded could be found.

Everyone was already dead.

Aerith fell to the ground.

* * *

When Aerith opened her eyes, she saw eyes of the brightest blue. They were like his eyes. And yet even before she could clearly see his face, she could sense that these eyes held no love for her.

"She just fainted, Barret," Tifa said.

Yuffie groaned. "Men."

Aerith sat upright.

"Are you alright?" Cloud said. Aerith could count his questions of her on one hand. To his credit, he sounded a little concerned.

"I dreamt about this last night," Aerith said.

Cloud narrowed his eyes. He was a famously unreadable man; and yet Aerith detected a note of disdain in something about the arch of an eyebrow or the turn of a lip.

"Sephiroth did this," she said.

That got him.

Cloud grasped her shoulders. His fingers tightened. "How do you know? Tell me!"

"Stop it, Cloud." Tifa drew him away and held her hand to his shoulder, reassuring.

"I saw him do it," Aerith said.

Aerith stood. She sat with the others at the bar. Tifa sat near Cloud and Aerith felt a little guilty. She had not done anything wrong, per se, but shocking Cloud had sent a vicarious shock through Tifa. She disguised it better, but whatever emotional scars she carried throbbed with every mention of the name "Sephiroth."

"So what's this Sephiroth doing anyway?" Barret said.

"Shinra seemed really interested in him," Aerith said.

"What kind of connection do they think you have to him?" Cloud said.

"In a week of being a hostage, I never figured that out," Aerith said. "They were grasping at straws—trying to come up something—anything—to connect us. It was crazy. I'd never heard of him before that."

"Zack never talked about him?" Cloud said. Aerith never mentioned anything about him to Cloud. Tifa must have told him.

"Zack didn't talk about his job much. Not when he was around me." Aerith smiled a wistful smile. "When we first met, he tried to impress me by telling me he was a SOLDIER. He was trying to be so macho. I just told him I didn't care. I think that actually impressed him. And helped us. He knew around me he didn't have to be that."

Yuffie looked at Aerith and scrunched her brow.

"Back to this Sephiroth thing," Cid said, "Maybe it wasn't so crazy after all."

"What do you mean?" Aerith said.

"Well… you think it's crazy that Shinra took you hostage and tried to get this information out of you even though you didn't know anything. Trying to make a connection. Well… you say you saw him last night. Guess what… it looks like, yeah, you two do have a connection."

An uneasy silence filled the room.

"They're going to want you more than ever and somehow they're gonna try to get you again," Barret said. This seemed to irritate him.

"I guess you'll have to be ready for them then," Tifa said.

* * *

Aerith concluded there was no fresh air in Sector Seven. Not really. The roof of Seventh Heaven was just as stifling as the ground level. Aerith had tried transplanting flowers to her windowsill, but they would not grow. Nothing was meant to live in a place like this.

"You're really that good with materia, Yuffie?" Aerith said.

"Are you kidding me?" Yuffie said. "Shinra troops run away the minute they see me. They say, 'Oh no! It's Yuffie the Powerful!"

Aerith arched an eyebrow. "Tifa told me no one in AVALANCHE had been positively ID'd other than Cloud…"

"Well… They're so frightened as soon as they see me they forget 'cause all they can think about is running."

"That doesn't even make sense."

"I'm so famous and so good, they usually forget they saw me and keep running?"

"Can Tifa teach me how to use materia instead?" That was what Aerith wanted to say. She was too polite sometimes. "Oh, wow…"

"So this materia belongs to Cloud," Yuffie said. "Its energy has the power to heal wounds and ease pain. Hold onto it."

Aerith complied. As she held the small, glowing gem-like object, it seemed to resonate with her heartbeat. "Materia. This is a byproduct of the Lifestream, isn't it?"

"The Lifestream doesn't exist."

"You don't believe in it? You don't believe Cid's theory that mako is the Lifestream? That Shinra's mako plants are sapping the planet's life force?"

"Do you?"

"I'm starting to believe it."

"You all can believe what they want. I don't care. You don't have to believe in fairytales to know Shinra deserves to burn."

Aerith balked.

"Focus on the materia," Yuffie ordered.

Aerith bowed her head. "How do you make it cast a healing spell?"

"You tell it to."

Aerith shook the materia. "Cast a healing spell."

Yuffie sighed. "Newbies… Look, not for real. Just think it. Make it happen with your mind."

"I'm not sure I'm getting it."

"It's alright. Not everyone can do it well. Some people have more of a gift than others!"

"That's what Zack told me about poker. I'm stubborn."

Yuffie's eyes narrowed. "Some boyfriend."

"He had his flaws, but he was sweet."

"Tell me more about him."

"We met one afternoon. He was on duty and stumbled into Sector Five." Aerith giggled. "Literally."

"On duty from what?"

"He was a SOLDIER."

Yuffie watched Aerith with an unreadable face. "Was this a little before this thing in Nibelheim Cloud and Tifa never talk about?"

"Oh, long before that. We knew each other for some time. He was young. Only sixteen. I was only fifteen. We were still very much children. I didn't see him much during those first years because he was always called away, fighting…"

Yuffie's eyes glimmered. "Fighting the Wutai Uprising?"

"I… I guess he was. He never talked about work. But… He was."

"Keep focusing on the materia," As Aerith puzzled over the glimmering stone, Yuffie continued. "Did anyone ever tell you what the SOLDIERs did to Wutainese civilians?"

Aerith closed her eyes. "I'm sorry Yuffie. I've done a lot of thinking in the years since he passed away. I'll admit I was a naïve young girl and as sweet as he was to me, I'm not going to pretend Zack was an angel."

"You were young and naïve when you were fifteen? Do you want to know what happened when I was young and naïve at nine?"

"Yuffie?"

"Concentrate on making the materia do what you want it to do," Yuffie circled like a vulture. That did not help Aerith's concentration. "The SOLDIERS were different, you know? They were strong. Better trained. In close quarters they used swords, like our man Cloud. You had to take them out from a long distance away, see. You had to use black magic materia or powerful guns. And if they saw you, it was over. They could close the distance so fast you wouldn't believe. I took out a few before my tenth birthday."

"Does Cloud know this?"

"He was still fresh meat when Nibelheim happened. He didn't know what SOLDIERs were really like."

"Zack wasn't like that…"

"Really? Let me tell you what they'd do if they caught you. They'd find out who you were and then they'd find your family. If you didn't talk, they'd play this game. They'd take their swords and they'd stab two people. And they'd get a stopwatch and keep time. They'd see who 'won'—who took the longest to die. Most of the time, it wouldn't matter. We didn't know anything. After Wutaifell, our resistance cells were so small, we didn't know anything. But the SOLDIERS did it for fun."

"I'm sorry, Yuffie. I had no idea…"

Yuffie paused. "Are you still having trouble?"

"I've never done this before."

Yuffie leaned in closer, almost nose-to-nose with Aerith. Aerith did not see the knife. Not until Yuffie grabbed her arm and thrust it cleanly through.

Yuffie withdrew the blade. Aerith collapsed to the ground. She tried to scream, but it only came out as a wheeze. She clutched her arm as though trying to hold back the blood draining onto the rooftop.

"Try again," Yuffie said.

Aerith whimpered.

"I said try again."

The materia rolled out of Aerith's hand and settled on the slate roof.

"You can whine all you want about how you didn't know what the soldiers were really like. It's people like you in Midgar with your warm, comfortable power grid who let Shinra get away with being so fucked up for as long as it has. 'Naïve' men and women who never stop and question and when they find out offer hypocritical condolences and cry crocodile tears. You may not get it yet, but this is a war we're in. Your boyfriend was a SOLDIER. You're just a sad little flower girl." Yuffie's cold eyes flashed. At last she looked at Aerith and really saw her. She recognized the pain and fear in Aerith's eyes. Yuffie picked up the materia and concentrated. Cool, glowing light calmed Aerith and soothed the burning pain.

Yuffie grimaced. "Shit."

* * *

Aerith finished her second beer. She was no longer in pain. The materia had assured that. Just the same, she had never in her life felt so rattled. She wanted to go "home" to Seventh Heaven. Yuffie had other plans. Aerith did not much care for them.

This bar made Seventh Heaven look like an upscale surface plate restaurant. It was the seediest place Aerith had ever been. A middle-aged businessman tried to slip some gil down her blouse. A few patrons wore outfits so heavy as to make them unidentifiable. They were engaging in some sort of transaction and Aerith doubted its legality. She realized after only a moment that staring was a really bad idea. The silver-haired man behind the bar was so heavily-scarred he appeared to have been in no less than a dozen knife fights. Or else had a lot of materia training with Yuffie.

Yuffie patted Aerith's back. "You're getting pretty good. And after only one day too. Who knows? With more practice, you just might be better than me."

Aerith avoided Yuffie's gaze.

"I'm so, so sorry, Aerith. Look, please, please, please don't tell Tifa what happened earlier. She would kill me. Maybe literally. Have you seen her angry before? There's nothing else like it in the world. She's so scary. You're like her new pet or something. She's very protective."

Aerith glowered.

"I've got a psychiatric condition, okay? I've even got the documentation to prove it. I didn't mean to… I just get… carried away sometimes." She stammered for the right words. "Another beer, Setzer."

The silver-haired bartender nodded an acknowledgement.

"So you're not going to stay mad, are you?" Yuffie said.

"I won't," Aerith said. "I just want to go home. Truthfully. I don't need to see your 'documentation.' And I'm not going to say I'm not upset. But I'm not even going to pretend I know what you went through growing up."

Yuffie's eyes narrowed.

"You said it yourself. I'm just a flower girl."

Yuffie cleared her throat. "I didn't mean it like that. Look… maybe we can start over again…"

A feminine voice called from across the bar. "So there you are, Yuffie-wuffie!"

Yuffie and Aerith turned simultaneously. A statuesque blonde waded through the crowd toward the bar. She wore something bright red that appeared to be something between a dress and a cape. It was the lowest v-neck Aerith had seen in her entire life. A tall, thin bodyguard and a short, fat one flanked the blonde, both enshrouded in flowing blue.

Yuffie's face revealed stark fear. "Oh shit, the Syndicate found me!"

"The Syndicate?" Aerith said. "What's that?"

"You didn't think AVALANCHE was the only group of outlaws down here in Sector Seven, did you? No. They're grifters, loan sharks, and thieves. That's their leader. LeBlanc."

Aerith hazarded another glance over her shoulder. "What is she wearing, anyway? I mean… how does that stay on?"

"Beats the hell out of me…" Yuffie hushed as the blonde's hand fell across her shoulder.

"You haven't been returning my calls, Yuffie-Wuffie!"

"Sorry LeBlanc. I've been busy."

"You weren't hoping I would forget the little-bitty matter of your debt… did you?"

Aerith watched Yuffie shuffle her feat. "Debt?"

"Your friend enjoys the chocobo races, but couldn't pick a winner to save her life," LeBlanc said.

Yuffie mumbled something in audible.

The tall, thin one laughed. "You certainly don't look quite so smug now, do you, Miss Kisaragi?"

"Better pay up," the fat one said.

"I have the money, LeBlanc," Yuffie said. "I can get it to you this afternoon."

Aerith heard a faint click. The tall one drew a long-barreled revolver. Nearby conversations halted.

"If you have the money, then perhaps you should take us to it right now," the tall one said.

Yuffie fidgeted with something behind her back. "Fuck off, Logos."

The tall one reeled back as though injured by her words.

"You've got a lotta balls talkin' to us like that!" the fat one said. "No one does that!"

"Logos, Ormi, why so serious? She is clearly just enjoying a drink with her precious friend here and clearly had no intention of this meeting turning into something… unsightly." LeBlanc laughed and pinched Aerith's cheek.

Yuffie glowered. "Don't touch her. Don't touch me. Don't come to Seventh Heaven either. You'll all end up in boxes. Tifa would be happy to hear you want a rematch, LeBlanc."

LeBlanc moved nose-to-nose with Yuffie. The bar hushed. The bartender did not move a muscle. "That leaves us only one choice then."

Yuffie smirked. "Doesn't it?"

A loud bang echoed through the bar and light flashed. "Now, Aerith! Run!" Yuffie yelled, but Aerith could not see. The smoke burned her eyes. She was struck by body parts flailing blindly in the chaotic smoke-filled room. An elbow struck her across the face as she tried to move and then someone tripped across her thigh. Feet struck and trampled her. By the time the smoke cleared, she struggled with consciousness.

"Dammit. She got away again," LeBlanc said.

"So?" We follow her back to Seventh Heaven and take the Wutainese bitch out once and for all," the fat one, Ormi, said.

"Are you mad?" The thin one, Logos, said. "Perhaps if we had a small army. They say Cloud Strife was a SOLDIER and AVALANCHE has others nearly as strong as he."

LeBlanc walked in a slow, slithering gait across the bar. A hooded figure lay prone, moaning at Aerith's side. LeBlanc kicked him in the face until he moved. Stiletto heels drew closer and closer to her face.

"This friend of hers is a lovely one indeed," LeBlanc said. "You don't often find such beauty in the slums of Sector Seven. Where are you from, girl?"

Aerith coughed. "The slums of Sector Five."

LeBlanc laughed. "Charming indeed." Her lips twisted into a cold, cruel smirk. "It would be a shame to waste such charm. And indeed you, my dear, will help me recoup my investment if your friend won't even talk to me!" She snapped. "Ormi!"

The fat one smirked and approached. The last waking thing Aerith saw was the flash of his boots. The world turned black.

* * *

Yuffie burst through the bar's back door and tripped on a raised stone. She tumbled feet-over-head and slammed into a dumpster. She burst into nervous laughter. "Let's get out of here, Aerith," she said. "Seventh Heaven is this way."

An interrupted couple glared at her from across the street. A cat meowed.

No one answered.

She was not behind her. "Aerith?"

Voices emerged from the front of the bar. Yuffie crept towards the main road. She leapt into the shadow of a dripping gutter as the syndicate trio passed in front of her. They laughed and talked.

Aerith was across Ormi's shoulder, completely limp.

Yuffie watched them disappear down a narrow side road and her heart nearly stopped. "Shit, Tifa really is going to kill me."

* * *

When she opened her eyes, she saw nothing. When she tried to move, she found herself immobile. Dark, dank silence surrounded her. Dim ambient light alone filtered through the mason cellar. Buckled leather bound her wrists and ankles, stretching her across a hard table. The cool air prickled her skin all over her body.

And what was she wearing? It covered all the wrong places.

An oddly-enunciated voice spoke. "I see you're awake now, girly."

The grogginess subsided. She struggled against her bondage to no effect. He stood to her left, a chubby man in loose bright red. A shock of blond hair sprouted from the top of his head. He watched her with bug eyes; one of which, she noticed, was black and blue. And smirked. She felt like a coveted cut of steak.

"My name's Aerith. Not girly."

He chuckled. "If you want to be called by your real name that's all the same to me. Most would rather not."

"Who are you?"

"The Don of Sector Six."

Aerith surveyed the room. It was filled with contraptions and objects, most of which she could only guess their purpose. "What am I doing here?"

"An old associate brought you to me. I'm always ready to recruit new talent, you see." He stood and turned. Aerith saw a tattoo across the side of his skull. "Love," it read.

Aerith swallowed hard. "What sort of talent are you expecting me to have?"

"That will be for you to reveal to me."

"I've heard of you. Don Corneo. I heard you were searching for a wife."

His eyes brightened. "Oh, I am! But that is pleasure. You, my dear, will be business as well as pleasure."

Aerith grimaced. "And I guess I don't have any say in the matter, do I?"

"Of course not." He dragged a finger across her cheek. When she recoiled, he retreated a few steps. "Oh, don't worry, my pet. I will not hurt you. Tonight. Your training will begin tomorrow. We have a great number of clients with particularly… exotic… demands. I hope you have stamina!"

Aerith sighed. After only one day, she was wearier than she had been after a week of Shinra prison. "Seriously?"


	6. Chapter 6: Fear

**6**

**Fear**

Rude opened the sliding metal door. The room inside absorbed the flickering white-blue light of Shinra Tower with impenetrable darkness. The door closed. Rude's eyes adjusted to the blackness. The only light radiated from an overhead projector.

"I have the tea," he said.

Elena stood to accept the insulated paper cup. "Thanks Rude."

Reno waved, but neither stood nor removed his feet from the chair in front of him. "Did they have any donuts left?"

"Guess," Rude said.

"Dammit," Reno said. "Those SOLDIERS think they own the place. Too damn many of them. And now they're taking all the effin' donuts."

"The President wants them on standby in Midgar in case Sephiroth attacks," Elena said. "He had them recalled from everywhere. They probably _would_ be our only chance in an attack."

"I know," Reno said. "That doesn't mean I've gotta like it. Or them. All of 'em now are a bunch of punks. They think the mako treatment makes them so tough. Most haven't even seen any real action."

"Agreed," Rude said. "I haven't met a worthy Second Class since the Wutai War ended. Not since they brought in all the newbies a few years ago after…"

"We need to continue, ladies and gentlemen." Tseng spoke with the authoritative voice of a chiding parent. Rude forgot himself—forgot that topic was taboo.

"Right," Rude said. "No donuts."

Tseng aimed his laser pointer at the digital slide: to a rickety, rugged road through Sector Five. "Blank Lane is busiest from seven to nine in the morning. If we're lucky, and I think we will be, the operation will commence early in the morning, as soon as we get our signal from the plant. The target will be familiar with these streets so we'll need to be cleaner than we've ever been. And remember, we suspect she has some form of rudimentary telepathy. To be safe, we must not be seen. We're not going to drop in as usual. Interact with no civilians on the way there unless it's unavoidable. Everyone knows each other here. They'll single out strangers.

"Our backup will be the Tenth Platoon. Its CO, Lieutenant Wedge Antilles, is from this neighborhood. He'll help them avoid detection. As much as is reasonable."

Elena squinted and raised her hand. "Question."

"Yes, Elena," Tseng said.

"Our backup's CO is named Wedge?"

"Correct."

"Isn't that also the name of an AVALANCHE member?"

Tseng shrugged. "Different Wedge. It's a common name, Elena." He clicked a few buttons. A section of cobblestone path enlarged to reveal a secluded tunnel. "Lieutenant Antilles and his men will enter through Maintenance Tunnel 338 and wait here for our signal if things get hairy. Hopefully they won't. We can keep this as painless as possible, get in the house, grab the target, and then we catch AVALANCHE once and for all. Hopefully we won't even need Lieutenant Antilles. He's our first trump card."

"First?" Reno said.

Tseng nodded and flipped a switch. "Here's the building schematic. There's a tunnel under the house we began building after the Nibelheim incident. It ends below the dining room. We used it for surveillance during that time. More on that later. That will be our entrance point."

Tseng queued up another picture: a dark-haired woman with a taught, kind face. At her side was a girl in her late teens with auburn hair bound in a ponytail. "This is the target's foster mother. Her name is Elmyra Gainsborough. She's a pensioned widow. Husband fought in the first Wutai War.

Elena raised her hand. "Question…"

"Yes?"

"How is it we were able to find this Cetra so quickly after the Nibelheim incident?"

Tseng smiled. It was a smile that said maybe he was not supposed to tell this. He prided himself on his closeness with his unit. "We had her in our custody once before."

"What?"

"Aerith's family was killed when she was four years old. Her mother was the last true Cetra. Her name was Ifalna. She married Professor Gast Famis, formerly a Shinra researcher. They moved to a town called Icicle Inn and produced a half-breed child."

"Icicle Inn," Rude said. "I've never heard of it."

"That's because you don't snowboard. Besides that, it was wiped off the map eighteen or so years ago. Something attacked it."

Vincent sat forward in his seat. "What destroyed it… may I ask?"

Tseng flipped through a notepad. "Let me see… Where is that slide… Three-ninety-one…" Tseng clicked a few buttons. "This is one of the only clear pictures of the monster that destroyed Icicle Inn."

When Reno snickered, Tseng looked at the slide. "This is… not the monster that destroyed Icicle Inn. It's a picture of someone's penis."

It filled the entire wall.

Reno held his belly and laughed.

Elena groaned. "You disgust me, Reno."

"Yeah, blow me, Elena."

Tseng cleared his throat. "Reno, tell me. When was the last time you had KP duty? Those SOLDIERs are hungry."

Reno stopped laughing, with effort.

Tseng shuffled through the slides. Buildings, organizational charts, and pictures of a young girl with auburn hair in advancing ages flashed across the screen. Tseng stopped. The thing in the picture was either small or far away. Its body formed a dark silhouette against the tumultuous ocean. Its trunk was hominid, suspended from broad wings like those of a bat. None of the Turks spoke. They had seen stranger creatures, but few that were both so human and so animal.

Vincent sat at the edge of his chair.

"It doesn't match anything we have record of," Tseng said. "No one's seen anything like it before or since. It came and destroyed most of the town. Professor Gast and Ifalna seemed to have been the target. Their home was the center of the destruction. There were a few survivors. Their daughter, Aerith, was one of them. She was on her own, but somehow escaped to nearby Modeoheim. Shinra's Dr. Hollander found her."

"So she was _there_ when that happened?" Elena said.

"Hollander was still in contact with Gast up until he died. In hindsight, I think Hollander knew full well what Aerith was. She became one of his curiosities—one of his little toys that he wanted to figure out how worked. After our crackdown on Hollander's illegal research, it was up to the Turks to decide what to do with his test subjects. Most of them had to be destroyed. Veld and I found Aerith locked up all alone in a cell with only a teddy bear. She was pretty shaken. We don't know what he did to her, but she seemed just like an ordinary little girl—as sane as can be expected under the circumstances.

"We took her to Midgar where she ended up in the foster system. We recovered Dr. Gast's records from that bastard Hojo after the Nibelheim incident. His videos gave us a better picture of what happened to Icicle Inn that day. Somehow, I remembered that little girl in Dr. Hollander's lab. All that to say, after that, it wasn't hard to track down Aerith."

"How much of this does the girl remember?" Elena said.

"As far as I could tell from the interrogation... nothing. If I were her I wouldn't want to remember either. Shinra has been unkind to her. A lot of people have."

Rude was first to break the silence. "So when do we do this?"

"I expect her to return home in the middle of the night within a day or two. They would never let her leave during the day. Our plant in AVALANCHE is monitoring the situation and will let us know as soon as it happens. I want to go over a few more details first. And then we'll prepare for the simulations. We need to be sure this will work."

That was his half-truth. It was his deflection. He was made aware of a serious problem by their mole in AVALANCHE. She was once again in a place Shinra dared not go. To someone, somewhere in Shinra's bureaucracy, Don Corneo was useful: the unloved bastard cousin who had to be invited to dinner. He protected Shinra interests and offered his connections. He provided information. He offered services Shinra employees used and demanded but to which they could never draw attention. Tseng dared not tell the Turks and he certainly dared not tell President Shinra the true holdup.

Their entire plan was contingent upon AVALANCHE rescuing their target from the Sector Six brothel.

* * *

After too many days of monotony or when she lingered in a dark room a little too long, the creeping fear slinked in from the ghostly places of her memory. It was an overwhelming sense of dread not tied to a clear thought or memory: just shadowy glimpses of loss, loneliness, darkness, and I.V. needles.

Her mother gave her the gift of her first real memories. Not the Cetra Ifalna who may as well have been a stranger. Elmyra Gainsborough. Aerith had always known she was not her biological mother, but that had never mattered. She had been the one to establish the continuity of her life. She had always been the one to save her from the fear.

Aerith had never been away from home so long in her life and it physically hurt.

Aerith was unbound and free to walk and move, but the fear shackled her. It kept her from running. It kept her from fighting. It bound her to the corpulent woman leading her through the halls an arm's distance away.

The woman descended a long, wooden railway to the chaotic bustle below. Ripples of fat undulated with every step. She panted half-way down the stairs. Between her morbid obesity and the ashen, almost blue hue of her translucent flesh, Aerith half-expected her to collapse dead under her own weight.

If only Aerith were that lucky this week.

The woman spoke in a deep, soulful voice, each sentence a libretto. "So tell me, child, are you a virgin?"

Aerith lifted her chin. "That's none of your concern."

The woman glared. "You will address me by my name and address me with respect."

"I hardly think that's any of your concern, Madam Brahne."

The madam's lip curled into a smirk. "A pity. I was hoping you were. You seemed so innocent. So pure. Some men would pay quite a premium to pluck such a lovely flower. Though I doubt the Don could have been dissuaded from breaking you in himself. He seems to quite fancy you."

"Enough to free me?"

"Of course not! He's never fancied a girl enough to prevent her every hole from being filled by other men nightly."

Aerith grimaced.

"No, no. Be prepared for tonight. The more he likes a girl, the more ruthless he can be."

"Lovely."

Madam Brahne fluttered the silky train of her dress as she stepped onto the smooth crimson carpet. She passed a young brunette in a slender bee costume. She was younger than most girls Aerith had seen here. Her cheeks were rosy and her features, fine. Her eyes still sparkled with vigor, if a little. Madam Brahne sneered at her. Aerith had trouble imagining the pale, pock-marked madam ever being beautiful. Maybe long ago, she had been like the other beautiful young things scattered throughout the salon, attracting the lusts of men. Even if she had been like them once, she regarded them now with hatred.

When Madam Brahne's eyes met Aerith's, that hatred seemed prepared to boil over. Instead, she smirked. She saw into Aerith's future and it satisfied her. It excited her. And so she smiled a Cheshire cat smile and led Aerith across the salon with a gracious bow.

"Hey, you!"

Aerith turned to the brash older teenager with strawberry blond hair and a scar across his brow. He lounged across a couch with a bee-costumed girl under each arm. He leered and undressed her from head to toe. It did not take much. Her skirt stopped just below the curve of her bottom and the sequin top may have offered a rare glimpse or two if the angle was right and she bent a certain way.

"Want me to be your knight in shining armor?" he said.

"She's new, Seifer," Brahne said.

He frowned. "Maybe in a couple of days. After you've been broken in. I'm a nice guy."

"Perhaps so." Brahne smiled with courtesy and rushed Aerith along.

"Knight?" Aerith said.

"He has a thing for fantasy role-playing. Every man here has his own 'thing.'"

Aerith passed another bee-girl only to realize, upon second glance, it was a bee-boy. And a young one at that.

They passed a wet-bar, staffed by a girl in a white robe marked by red triangles, ending mid-thigh. A man with gelled red hair and a goatee sat upright and lowered sunglasses to look at Aerith as she passed. He did not say a word, but watched her with the intent of a hungry cat tracking prey until she disappeared around a corner.

"That was Johnny," Brahne said. "He's partial to our girl, Rinoa, who resembles a childhood friend."

Aerith rounded a corner. She almost called out to Tifa. Then she realized the girl with artificial feathered wings and an all-but transparent costume walking into a side room was not her. She led a young man with mottled brown hair by a chain leash. She closed and locked the door.

Aerith continued down the long, darkening corridor. The stale perfume of the salon's effect lessened the further she walked and her sensitive nose detected unidentifiable but unpleasant odors. Giggles, muffled cries, and beastial groans drifted to her ears. She turned with a start at a loud scream to her right.

"Don't worry child," Brahne said. "That's just the Tuestis. They're a bit older. But still feisty and adventuresome. They do enjoy fresh young meat from time to time."

Aerith lagged behind. Stray thoughts approached from behind closed doors: thoughts of things dark, sticky and putrid. With a sharp look from the madam, she caught up to her arm's-length following distance.

Brahne opened the portal door ahead of her and led Aerith inside. It was a vast room. Unlike the rest of the facility, filled with perfume and velvet and pink and pretension, it was un-dramatic—cellar-like. On racks from end to end was clothing of every shape and size. Aerith realized she was now "backstage."

"I will give you some choices with which you may stock your room," Brahne said. "Though you may wish to wait until tomorrow before you establish your own sense of style. Your experience with the Don may change your outlook on some things."

Brahne smirked at Aerith's reaction. "So," she continued, "We call this our dress grid. Here you may choose your costume, adornment, and playthings, when left to your own devices, or when there is a special request of you."

Brahne rifled through a rack of clothing and showed off several outfits to Aerith. Most revealed things they should have covered and covered things that did not matter. "I for one see you as a chemist, a white mage, a gunner, or a songstress." She withdrew a ruffled outfit of white and black and traced her hand down to its tapering skirt. At its side, Aerith saw a cylindrical aluminum tube. Brahne took it into her hands and sang a few bars of a song Aerith did not know.

"Does that microphone work?" Aerith said.

"This is not a microphone, my dear."

Aerith opened her mouth to speak, but stopped herself. Her departed boyfriend had expanded her mind more than most people would have believed, but some things still made her blush.

Madam Brahne spent several more minutes extolling the virtues of some outfits over others—cautioning her to prepare herself well when a customer requested the "chocobo girl" outfit. "They're the ones who make nasty requests." When Aerith was all but scared senseless, she escorted her back upstairs to her room.

"It's still early. Relax and enjoy yourself. You will find a few magazines in the nightstand. You had best prepare yourself for late tonight. It just might be the longest night of your life." Madam Brahne uttered a faint chuckle.

She left Aerith in the dark room.

* * *

"Welcome to the Honeybee Inn: the center of the universe," the girl with pale, silvery-blue hair said.

A servant brought lunch to Aerith's room: a sparse meal of pea soup and crusty bread. The knot in her stomach clenched tightly. Aerith doubted it would have allowed food to pass through and she did not even try to eat. She was lightheaded, observing the salon below from outside her door and the passers-by. She almost did not realize the girl next to her was speaking to her.

"What was that?" Aerith said.

"You're new here, aren't you, sugar?" she said.

"I am…"

"Ruby. My name's Ruby. Do you have a name?"

Aerith did not introduce herself.

Ruby smiled. "Still self-conscious, I see. You get over it. You get over it fast. I remember those first days." She took a puff of her cigarette. "Looks like someone's takin' an interest you."

Aerith looked below. A man who appeared to be almost as wide as two men of average weight made eye contact. A large beard concealed most of his face. He wore a pinstripe suit and a broad fedora.

He also seemed somehow familiar.

"That looks kinda like General Heideggar of Public Safety," Ruby said.

The man spoke with Madam Brahne. She pointed to Aerith and flailed her arms. Even without hearing, Aerith could tell it was a spirited discussion. After a moment, Madam Brahne walked away.

"You know General Heideggar?" Aerith said.

"We haven't seen him in a while, but he was a regular for a while. That does look an awful lot like him."

"Heideggar here?"

"Men are men. Big or small, they have the same needs. That's what this place is for. Because they _need_ us."

Madame Brahne returned several minutes later. Don Corneo followed close behind. He exchanged cursory greetings, or at least appeared to do so. Aerith still could not hear. The two men and Madam Brahne walked off towards a side room that Aerith had been able to identify as an office of some sort. They closed the door.

That was when Aerith realized she was the subject of negotiations.

One thought struck fear into Aerith's heart. It didn't look exactly like him as she remembered, but then she had not seen him in the best light. Was that really General Heideggar here? For her?

"We have power over them, you know," Ruby said. She gazed ahead, speaking at Aerith, not to her. "They know it too. That's why they keep us here. The world's most powerful man is a little old ball of putty in the hands of the right woman."

Aerith took her eyes away from the office. "Really."

"Do you know what the love of Rufus Shinra's life is?"

"No."

"Neither do I. But whatever it is, it ain't a woman. He has none of them in his life. That's what makes him powerful. That's why he's a Shinra and not a Heideggar."

Aerith thought it was an interesting theory. She decided against mentioning that she had met Rufus Shinra in person. From her brief experience, she doubted celibacy alone could account for the hawkish gleam in those eyes.

Ruby grew silent—introspective. "I wasn't always like this."

"What were you… before?"

Ruby offered a rueful smile. "An actress. My parents got me into it. I performed all over Midgar into my teenaged years. And then as I grew out of the youth stage, my parents wanted even bigger opportunities for me. They got me a new agent. And he…" she sighed. "Introduced me to Don Corneo. He was impressed with my performance. When I got older and became just another adult actress and stopped billing high, I still had debt and I owed him. He found me a new kind of stage." A twitch of her eyes snapped her back to reality—back to the present. "That was then. This is now."

A man with hazelnut hair ascended the stairs. He watched Ruby with intent eyes. Eyes as blue as _his_.

He was a SOLDIER.

"Well, hello stranger," Ruby said.

"Not interrupting you, am I?" the SOLDIER said.

"Not at all, sugar." She shifted her weight against the railing and arched her back. Her ample cleavage bulged from her dress.

"Your name?" he said.

"Ruby."

His eyes gleamed. "So tell me, Ruby. What's a girl like you doing in a place like this? You don't deserve to be a bird in a cage like this."

"Maybe not, but I'll tell you Sugar, tonight, I want to be your canary…"

Ruby whispered into his ear and chuckled. She opened the door and led him into the room beside Aerith's. Aerith watched and saw Ruby's sly smile disappear for less than a second with his back to her.

The door closed and locked behind them.

The downstairs office door finally opened. Madam Brahne walked out more quickly than a woman of her size seemed capable of walking. She hiked up the train of her dress and ascended the stairs towards Aerith.

"He agreed to no penetration," Madam Brahne said. "So the Don consented. This is such a rare case, but it seems he truly was transfixed by you, child. And he offered a handsome sum for only a polishing."

Aerith opened her mouth to ask what this "polishing" entailed. Zack had not told her many things after all.

"Do as he says, but tell us if he attempts anything forcefully," Brahne said. "If so, he will be separated from a pair of old, dear friends."

Aerith blinked.

"Inside! Go!" Brahne said. "Prepare yourself. He wants you just as you are."

"I'm not doing it," Aerith said.

"It is your choice then. Just remember should you fail to perform, the consequences for you will be most severe."

Aerith walked into her room and Madam Brahne slammed it behind her.

The knot in Aerith's stomach expanded until her entire body quivered. The crippling fear gave way to anger. She was angy at Madam Brahne and Don Corneo for putting her here and auctioning her. She was angry at the corpulent man—maybe General Heideggar—for singling her out, whatever his intentions. She was angry at Yuffie and LeBlanc for getting her into this mess. She was even angry at Tifa for asking a certifiable sociopathic to teach her how to defend herself.

Aerith was tired of the captivity. She was tired of the exploitation. Most of all, she was tired of the fear.

Aerith's chamber was Spartan and utilitarian. Don Corneo furnished it with a bed, a nightstand, and a couple of chairs, and really, the bed was all that was meant to be used. He furnished only one admirable piece of flair: a porcelain desk lamp. A respectable artisan painted it with a pale blue scene of waterfowl by a creek.

When the plump figure entered and closed the door behind, Aerith smashed it over his head.

He stumbled forward and grunted in a surprisingly squeaky voice. He tried to turn, but Aerith threw herself across his back. He was no taller than her and Aerith knew she had a chance, so emboldened she was by her fury. Aerith wrapped her arm across his neck and pulled.

He gurgled and struggled against her.

"You are not going to get your way you Shinra asshole!" she shouted. "I'm not going back there and I'm not going to let you touch me!"

"He" spoke in a high, familiar voice. "Aerith, what the fuck?"

Aerith's hot rage cooled. She reconnected with her senses and felt the resonance of her caller—recognized its warm familiarity.

"He" was a she.

Aerith dropped away.

The bushy fake beard dangled from her face. Strands of long, dark brown hair escaped from the big cap.

"Tifa?"

Tifa choked and gave Aerith a quiet smile. "I'm glad to see you still have energy and some fight in you."

Though Tifa was a more welcome sight than Aerith had seen in a long time, the tight knot of anger in her core refused to go away. "You want me to apologize now or something?"

Tifa leaned back as if slapped. "What?"

"This has been the single worst day of my entire life!"

Tifa's eyes widened. "Were you hurt? Did anything…?"

"No I wasn't. But do you have any idea what it's like, Tifa? Being held hostage? Chained? Constantly and cheerfully reminded that at the end of the day, I'd be… 'broken in?' Raped and tortured? Do you have any idea what that's like?"

Tifa spoke with deliberation. "No, I don't."

"And another thing! If you were Yuffie, I'd still be swinging at you."

"She'll behave from now on. I promise."

"Don't you see? There isn't going to be a 'from now on,' Tifa."

The door banged. Tifa and Aerith jumped.

"What's going on in there?" Madam Brahne's voice reverberated through the door.

Tifa's voice dropped lower. It warbled into the higher octaves, but it was almost convincingly male. "It's okay. I asked her to do that."

A pause. "Aerith. girl?"

"I'm fine. He's a playful one." Aerith tried to sound cheerful.

A moment later, footsteps trailed down the stairs.

Aerith spoke more quietly. "How did you do that?"

"Energy training with Zangan," Tifa said. "You have to have a lot of control over your diaphragm."

"Oh…"

"I don't know how much time we've got. I have to get you out of here."

"Why did you come here, Tifa?"

"I got you into this mess. I should be the one to get you out. We need to get back out of here and get back to Sector Seven."

"I don't want to go back to Sector Seven."

"Look, I know it's not the nicest place, but there are people who can care for you. Shinra will never find you. You can have a life of your own there with us."

"And I'll end up becoming just like you?"

Tifa glared, shocked.

"Please. You don't even want that life for yourself."

"Look… Aerith…"

"I'm sorry. That wasn't fair. But I can't go back there."

Tifa hesitated. "I can understand you not wanting to go back. I really can…"

Aerith searched Tifa's face. "But going home… back to Sector Five's not an option anymore, is it?"

Tifa avoided eye contact.

"I know a lot about AVALANCHE now, don't I?" Aerith said. "What will Barret do to me?"

"Nothing. I won't let him."

"How am I supposed to believe that?"

"Because you're my friend."

"You've only known me for a week."

Tifa threw up her arms. "Do you want me to leave you here then?"

Aerith rubbed her temples.

"If you want to finish this fight later, we can," Tifa said. "If you want to just cut it all short and finish strangling me out, we can do that later too. But we really need to go now."

Aerith wiped her reddening eyes. "I'm sorry…"

Tifa's eyes softened. "Yeah. Me too."

"What's the plan," Aerith said.

Tifa opened the suit and reached past a layer of padding. She withdrew three glowing stones. "Yuffie taught you all about materia, right?"

* * *

No "polish" should have taken that long, even if the servicing girl _was_ an amateur. Madam Brahne stood at the base of the stairs and placed her foot on the landing, steeling herself for the climb that grew longer and longer with every passing year. At that moment, the door opened.

The plump businessman in the pinstripe suit who identified himself as Leo exited the room. He opened the door wide and held it open for a moment. With a ruffle of his suit, he began to descend the stairs.

To Madam Brahne, he seemed more uptight than he should have been given the circumstances. Their eyes met as he descended the stairs. "Leo" had assertive eye contact. It was too assertive. No man could match her gaze for so long.

And did the steps creak a little more than usual as he descended to the ground floor?

He grinned. "I hope you found my payment satisfactory, Madam." Brahne noticed a peculiarity about his voice.

She smiled nonetheless. "I hope you found our girl satisfactory."

"She was satisfying."

"And not too feisty, I hope?"

"What?"

"Those noises."

"Oh… no. She was quite accommodating."

Madame Brahne's eyes narrowed to slits. "Good. Then allow me check on her."

"Leo" blinked. "What?"

Don Corneo stepped out of his office and glared.

Madam Brahne ascended the stairs. "I must speak with her. We did have a deal, as you may recall. I must be sure you fulfilled your end of it."

Two guards flanked "Leo": one a burly dark-skinned man and the other a short, silver-haired woman; her left eye covered by an eyepatch.

Brahne opened the door to Aerith's room and peeked inside. She saw the disheveled bedsheets. She saw fragments of the broken lamp.

She did not see Aerith.

Scattered mumbling echoed through the salon below.

Standing next to "Leo," Aerith flickered into being, appearing from vacant air.

"Leo" looked Aerith up and down. Aerith held her hands in front of her face, noticing her own visibility.

Madam Brahne glared. She knew a "Vanish" spell when she saw one.

Don Corneo stood upright. His face reddened and quivered.

Tifa opened her coat and spoke into a metal transceiver. "Now, Cloud."

Three seconds later, the engine of a motorcycle growled through the promenade and into the salon. It jerked to a stop on the bright crimson carpet.

Don Corneo pointed. "Strife! Cloud Strife! How dare you!" The motorcycle's growl drowned out the rest of his screaming.

Tifa thrust her elbow into the burly guard and then kicked his companion in the face. "Get her, Cloud."

Cloud scooped up Aerith. She fumbled to mount the motorcycle as he rode off.

Don Corneo approached Tifa, standing alone in the center of the room. "So shall we see what your breaking point is, little girl?"

Tifa smirked. "Not tonight."

A smoke bomb exploded and filled the room with clouds of smelly grime.

Don Corneo choked. "Damn you, Strife!"

* * *

Aerith wrapped her arms around Cloud's midsection as they sped towards the expressway. It was an awkward feeling. He was an awkward man. Aerith knew he wished she were Tifa in their current position. She made him very uncomfortable. In fleeting, unpredictable moments, his thoughts were an open book to her. He seemed to know it.

She glanced over her shoulder and saw Yuffie and a costumed Tifa rushing out the front door as smoke wafted out behind them. Yuffie mounted a motorcycle parked alongside the Honeybee Inn and Tifa hopped on behind. Aerith looked away and hoped never to see the brothel again.

"Why didn't you go inside?" Aerith said.

"What?" Cloud said.

"Why did Tifa dress in drag to get inside? It might have been easier for you to get in."

"I would have been recognized. Even in costume. You saw Don Corneo's black eye, didn't you?"

"I did."

"That was me and Barret a couple of days ago."

"Oh…"

"Besides. I never go in there. Never."

"Why not?" Aerith asked.

Cloud glared over his shoulder.

Aerith knew to drop the subject.

Cloud slowed. Tifa and Yuffie sped up and pulled alongside her.

"Tifa, your bristles!" Yuffie said.

Tifa discarded the fake beard. She glanced across the lane to Coud. They nodded to each other. Her eyes caught Aerith and she looked away.

Aerith trembled for the cold and tried not to cry.

For the rest of the drive through Midgar, Aerith remained quiet. Cloud did not seem like the kind of man to needlessly interrupt quiet. For that, she was grateful.

When they entered Seventh Heaven, most of AVALANCHE was waiting for them. Aerith passed a deactivated Cait Sith: slumped over in an unsettling way, facing the door. Wedge and Biggs approached. They liked Aerith; regardless, their greetings were subdued. Biggs in particular seemed to detect the chilly aura in the room.

Cloud walked away straight to his room. Yuffie followed upstairs. Cid and Barret watched from a nearby table.

Aerith retreated to her room. Darkness fell. She collapsed into a quivering heap on her bed and remained there, motionless. The cool air of the ceiling fan brushed across her body. The silence washed across her soul. She remained motionless for hours that seemed like minutes.

* * *

Tifa knocked on Aerith's door at three a.m. She could not sleep, but she imagined, neither could Aerith. There was no answer.

It was _her_ bar.

Tifa opened the door and entered. Through the artificial green glow filtering in through the window shades, she saw the lump under the covers. Tifa sat at the foot of her bed.

"Before he died, my father always told me never to go to bed angry," Tifa said. "I'm not really angry at you. A little at what you said… but I feel sick with myself more than anything. I'm not going to pretend to know what you've been through for the last two days, but I'm sorry if I wasn't as sympathetic as I could have been. I'm trying to work on that.

"You see… I'm not used to having friends. That's the long and short of it. I don't know how to act around other girls. You're the first one who's been patient enough with me. It's scary, but I wish I could tell you how much it's meant to me, having you here."

The lump on the bed remained still.

Too still.

Tifa threw aside the covers. She had been talking to the room's spare pillows.

"Dammit."

* * *

Tifa had been right. She knew from the moment she arrived in her neighborhood, something was amiss. It was not yet even sunrise. She clutched the materia Tifa had given her under her coat as she walked through the lamp-lit streets towards her house. She brought nothing else. AVALANCHE provided all of her clothing and amenities. She took with her only what she had left home with weeks before. Except for the materia. In the wake of the Honeybee Inn, she had a hunch she might need it.

Aerith was starting to hate her own hunches.

She strolled through the run-down street—in a better state of repair than most of Sector Seven, but not by much. At least it was a familiar sort of run-down, she thought. But something was different. She detected a pulse of activity somewhere nearby. As far as she could tell, none of her neighbors were awake.

But someone was.

A light gleamed through a window of her mother's house—not a big, bright light, but an inconspicuous light. It made Aerith very nervous. Her mother had no inconspicuous lights.

She balked at the front door. She knew now she was walking into a trap. Someone had seen her and trying to run would only drag out the inevitable. She was already as good as caught. Regardless, something had changed at the Honeybee Inn.

The fear had tempered her—strengthened her. Aerith swore she would never allow herself to be taken captive again. Not without a fight.

Aerith felt a presence approach from behind as she stepped away from her door. He stood close enough to touch and his aura shimmered and flickered in a way she had never encountered before. He existed on a strange, unpredictable wavelength.

His cold, dark voice penetrated her skull. "You're not leaving just yet, are you?"

Aerith turned. His night-black hair fanned across uncanny crimson eyes. He pressed a three-barreled pistol to her abdomen.

Curiosity outweighed her fear. "What are you?"

"I'm a member of the Turks."

"No… I mean… _what_ are you?"

Vincent Valentine smirked.


	7. Chapter 7: The Dirge of Cerberus

**7**

**The Dirge of Cerberus**

It was the most dangerous part of the plan. Cloud tried to dissuade her, but someone had to do it. Aerith knew too much about AVALANCHE to fall into Shinra's hands. Tifa had already put her life on the line rescuing Aerith from Don Corneo. Still, she felt in her gut that somehow she still owed Aerith. Aerith had not come out and said so, but Tifa knew she held her indirectly responsible.

Having a close friend and confident was a new experience for Tifa. In the span of a week, it had gone from exciting and new to annoying.

Tifa closed her eyes and cleared her mind. She remembered Aerith's address with effort. She noticed the playground in the back yard about which Aerith loved to reminisce. And then she saw the flicker of a shadow past the front window. It was not quite the crack of dawn yet. The neighborhood was quiet given there was a Shinra military operation in progress.

Turks. It had to be the Turks.

Tifa spoke into her headset. "No activity. I'm going inside." She knocked on the door.

Time to walk into the trap.

There was no answer for almost a full minute.

"Aerith? Are you in there?" Tifa said.

"It's early," Aerith said from the other side of the door.

"We need to talk."

No answer. After another minute, the door creaked opened.

Aerith stood fully dressed, wearing the rugged pink dress she had worn at arrival in Sector Seven. She frowned; almost glared at Tifa.

"You shouldn't have come," Aerith said.

"I know."

The Shinra foot soldier pressed the barrel of his rifle harder to Aerith's temple.

Tifa had never seen him so close before, but she recognized the leader of the Turks. Two navy blue-suited men, one with bright red spiked hair and another bald sat in the living room by a blond woman. Three foot soldiers stood nearby. One held a rifle to a woman with graying hair and dark, blue eyes. She was old enough to be her grandmother and bore no real resemblance to Aerith.

So that was Aerith's "mother."

"Come in, young lady," Tseng said.

Tifa stepped inside. A foot soldier slammed the door behind her.

"Are you alright, Aerith?" Tifa said.

Aerith swallowed. "I'm not hurt."

Tifa looked Tseng in the eye. "What happens now?"

"Now we wait and see how much you matter to your comrades," Tseng said. "And if they don't come, we're taking you in for questioning. You won't get off as easy as Aerith did. We showed some sympathy for a hapless flowergirl. A wanted terrorist? Not so much."

"Let go of them," Tifa said.

"Look around. You're not in any position to make demands. Reno. Frisk her."

Reno stood and smirked. He drew his weapon. His eyes scanned the lines of her body. He made no attempt to hide his lust.

Tifa controlled her emotions. She was patient.

Reno pushed her into the wall by the stairs. She stumbled and when he reached to clasp her, the coiled energy in her pit sprang.

She grasped his weapon and twisted his stray arm into a tight knot behind his back with a loud "pop." She aimed his gun-arm at the Shinra soldier holding Aerith. Reno struggled, but she kept control.

She squeezed his trigger finger. The bullet struck the soldier in the torso. Tifa's swiveled Reno's arm. Another gunshot reported. The soldier holding Elmyra Gainsborough fell.

Aerith and Elmyra ran across the room to Tifa. The soldiers writhed on the ground, wounded.

Reno squirmed against Tifa's iron grip. "Fucker!"

Tseng glanced down at the wounded soldiers and then looked back up to Tifa. "So I see the rumors that one of Zangan's pupils joined AVALANCHE were true."

"Aerith, Elmyra, run!" Tifa said.

Tseng raised his hand. "I wouldn't do that."

Rude, Elena, and the remaining foot soldiers drew their pistols and aimed.

Tifa grasped Reno tightly, snaring him with her leg. She swiveled his gun about to his own temple. "Don't do anything or else he dies."

Reno's eyes grew as wide as saucers.

Tseng shrugged. "Okay. Shoot him."

Reno's face froze in rigid mortification. "Tseng?"

"Sorry Reno. You were a good soldier." Tseng looked back at Tifa. "You heard me. Shoot him. And then you'll die."

"Aerith matters to you, doesn't she?" Tifa said.

"Aim for the legs, men," Tseng said.

The foot soldiers with rifles trained on Aerith and Elmyra lowered their barrels.

Aerith and Elmyra huddled together, frozen by the stairs.

A voice crackled through a radio beside Tseng. "Sir, the target is approaching from South Blank Street."

"Destroy it quickly and completely, Lieutenant Antilles," Tseng said.

"Yes sir."

* * *

When the dawn light turned a certain shade of bronze and penetrated Hilda's pale blue curtains, she did as she did every morning for twenty years: she fed her three cats, opened her mothball-scented closet, put on her broad-brimmed hat, and slipped on her snug slippers. She adjusted her hat such that it part-way veiled her face. She did not consider herself paranoid, but like many in her neighborhood, relished in her anonymity. A shared desire to be alone bound the neighborhood. She walked out her front door when the dim sunlight cast long, hiding shadows to fetch her newspaper.

Not four feet out her front door, she knew something was wrong—knew it instinctually. Lights glowed within Elmyra's house next door. Elmyra was not due to awaken for another thirty minutes. Her schedule had fluctuated more and more since her daughter disappeared, but it did not fluctuate that much.

A strange quiet weighed on the neighborhood. Birds did not chirp as they should have.

Hilda lowered her hat, steeled herself, and fetched the paper. She retreated to the threshold of her house when an eerie sound broke the more eerie silence. The clunky green van ambled over the patchwork pavement in the pre-dawn light. Apart from being the most hideous vehicle she had seen in her entire life, something about it did not belong.

Hilda heard an unfamiliar rumbling from the opposite end of Blank. She never saw the tank, but she heard the deafening roar and the whistle of munition through air. She saw the flash of light and felt the concussive blast push her back into her home as the van exploded in a ball of fire.

* * *

"Target neutralized, sir," the voice over the radio crackled.

"Send out a squad to search the vehicle. If anything's alive in that van, kill it immediately." Tseng watched Tifa's eyes closely. "Your friends were actually audacious enough to use that van after your little stunt on the surface plate last week. That was their fatal flaw."

Though he did not struggle at all, Tifa clutched Reno tighter.

"So where were we…" Tseng said. "That's right. You were going to shoot him."

Reno's eyes pled and teared. "Tseng!"

Tifa clenched her mouth and tightened her lips.

"What are you waiting for? Wait a minute… I think I know. You can't do it." Tseng advanced a step.

"Stay where you are!" Tifa barked.

"We've seen you, you know. We've been following your actions. You're quite a fighter and I have no doubt you could do it. I guess you have no qualms with a dozen innocent Shinra Electric employees manning a control booth and five civilian bystanders, but when you're face to face, you can't do it." He waved to the wheezing foot soldiers on the ground. "You could have killed _them_ just now."

"I'll do it," Tifa said.

Tseng shook his head and drew closer. "No you won't. It's over now. Your friends are either dead or will be soon. It would be pointless. You won't kill him. I can see your hesitation and your ambivalence. Terrorism is a job for monsters. I see now you're not a monster, Tifa."

Startled by her own name, Tifa arched her back and tightened her lips.

She swiveled Reno's gun to bear on Tseng and squeezed his trigger finger.

Tseng recoiled back, struck in the shoulder. The foot soldiers brought their guns around the bear on Tifa.

Dozens of bullets connected with Reno, a human shield.

Tifa held Reno's limp body. "Upstairs!" she yelled. Past whizzing bullets, Elmyra and Aerith crawled to the second floor. Tifa followed upstairs and half-way up, kicked Reno down, turning and sprinting up the remainder of the way. A bullet grazed her calf. Three more millimeters and she knew she would have been paralyzed.

Elmyra shook on the ground. Splinters of wood drifted through the air past her face and nearly blinded her. "Aerith? Who are these people?"

Aerith knelt just beyond the landing. "Not now, Mom! "Where are Cloud and the others, Tifa?"

Tifa clutched Reno's gun and fired a shot down the stairs. "Waiting for what just happened."

* * *

The Shinra foot soldiers approached the smoldering van with caution, rifles poised, as though anything could have survived that explosion. The rattle of muffled gunfire emanated from the Gainsborough residence. Some lights throughout the neighborhood flicked on; others flicked off. No one dared venture out into the street.

The squad leader urged his men closer, blocking out the sound from the nearby home. Noxious black smoke bellowed into the stifling air. With a hand gesture, he ordered the point man to open the front door. Three soldiers leveled their rifles into the imploded driver's cab.

There was no blood. There were no bodies; only a tangled mass of vinyl, steel, and sparking wires.

The squad leader approached and puzzled over the mangled figure in the driver's seat. The pungent smell of melted black nylon fur struck his nostrils. A palm-sized mechanical face stared at him with vacant eyes.

It looked strangely feline.

A rumble became audible not far down the road: the rumble of some distant vehicle. In the span of seconds, it was clearly no longer distant and then a shadowy form parted plumes of black smoke. The squad leader saw only a flash of silver, black and blond, a glimmer of steel, and then a splash of red.

He saw its full silhouette bank at an intersection and turn to come back. As he drew closer; as he brought Public Security's own sniper fire dangerously close, the squad leader saw the blade. It was a weapon only a SOLDIER could wield.

And that was the last thing he saw.

* * *

"Stay down," Tifa said.

The acridic smell of smoke and gunfire permeated the air. Aerith had never heard such loud noises in her entire life. Her mother was in a state of abject panic. She tried to soothe her as well as she could. There was not much point in that until they were to safety. Aerith herself observed her surroundings with a surreal calm. Tifa was already rubbing off on her. Aerith uncovered her ears. "What?"

"There are snipers down the block. Keep your head down at all cost and stay away from the windows."

"I have the materia," Aerith said. "I could vanish…"

Tifa fired off another shot down the stairs. She hit one of the foot soldiers in the leg and he limped out of view. "I know. Infrared scopes won't be fooled by that though. No. We're in a pretty tight spot."

"Really now?"

From around the wall, an arm threw a small cylindrical object up the stairs. Tifa caught it in mid-air and lobbed it back down. "Cover your ears," Tifa cried.

The cylinder flashed and a piercing ring echoed through the room. Downstairs they were getting it far worse.

Tifa's headset popped and she sat upright. "Yuffie? … Right. We're pinned down. They have us in a pretty bad spot." Tifa's eyes flashed to Aerith and Elmyra. "A diversion would be amazing right about now. … We're upstairs." Tifa blinked. "Yuffie, where are you right now? … Are you kidding me?"

"What?" Aerith said.

Tifa shushed her. "The front door. … Aerith still has it. Give me a sec." Tifa clicked off the headset. "We have a plan…"

Elmyra whimpered. "What's going on? Will someone please tell me?"

Aerith pressed her palm to her mother's temple. That calmed her, if a little. "We can talk all about this later, Mom. What's going on, Tifa?"

"We just might make it out of here alive. In just a minute, I think we'll be able to get out of here… But I need to tell you both something…"

Aerith and Elmyra listened.

"You'll never be able to come back to this house ever again."

* * *

Cloud gripped the handles and jerked hard, spinning his motorcycle around in a tight "U." The rifle round would have plinked him in the shoulder if not for the abrupt turn. His rear wheels struggled to grip the worn, under-maintained pavement for precious milliseconds and then he was racing to the other end of the street. He had trouble imagining how they would all survive this encounter, but it was encouraging he had not been shot yet. He knew the moment he stopped moving, his luck would run out.

His headset clicked to life. "_Cloud?_"

"Yuffie?"

Cloud thought he heard a strange, low rumble in the background. "_How're you doing?_"

"I could use some relief any time now."

"_Well, I think you're in luck. You about ready to rendezvous with Barret and Cid_?"

"Yeah, but we need more cover. I wasn't expecting them to bring a damn tank."

Yuffie chuckled. "_I got dealt a hand you wouldn't believe if I told you. Get ready to go for the sewers._"

Cloud heard the rumbling of the enormous engine and saw the armored vehicle draw closer. Its treads ground to a halt and its barrel angled at him. He had seen such vehicles before. Zack often spoke with an uncharacteristic ambivalence about the havoc they wreaked upon the Wutainese countryside. And now one was aiming straight at him.

At least one was. The barrel of its main gun swiveled to aim at the Gainsborough residence.

Cloud heard another voice through his headset. It was the distorted sound of a radio near Yuffie's own. "_Five-Niner, why aren't you responding? Come in! Report! Where the hell are you going?_"

Cloud resisted the urge to stop the motorcycle. "Yuffie? Are you where I think you are?"

* * *

Tseng tried to shake off the ringing in his ears: the lingering effects of the flash grenade. His shoulder was sore. Kevlar seemed like the best invention ever. "It could be better," he said.

Even over the transmitter, Lieutenant Antilles sounded flustered. "_The second squad has been dispersed by the SOLDIER, Strife. We're looking at at least eighty percent casualties._"

"Use your full firepower. Don't hold anything back."

"_I didn't want to compromise the safety of the civilian population sir…_"

"Lieutenant, have you ever seen a SOLDIER in action before? They were made to be hard to kill. If you hold back at all, he will bury you and your men. Understood?"

"_U… Understood… sir._"

"Over and out." Tseng turned. "Are you alright Reno?"

Reno squirmed on the ground as Elena concentrated on her healing spell. "You shot me! You bastards shot me, like, fifty times!"

"That's what happens when you let yourself get taken hostage, Reno," Rude said.

"Fuck yourself Rude. You assholes. I hate you. I hate you all."

The transmitter crackled again. "_Sir, we have a problem._"

Tseng prided himself on being able to maintain cool composure no matter what. In that moment, he struggled. "What's going on, Lieutenant Antilles?"

"_Unit five-Niner isn't responding to our hails and his movement's have become erratic. We fear it's been subdued by the enemy!_"

Tseng struggled to hear over the gunfire and conversation amongst the Turks. "Five-Niner… isn't that…?"

The street-side wall disappeared in a flash of smoke, fire, and debris. Everyone standing fell as the house half-way collapsed upon itself.

"Five-Niner" was the tank.

* * *

Yuffie watched the smoke plume rise into the sky through the large turret's sights. For precious minutes, Yuffie could tell no one knew friend from foe; who was alive and who was dead. She kicked the bound and gagged tank crew chief. "Ha! I wish I could take this bad-boy home with me."

As the Gainsborough residence smoldered, Shinra soldiers scattered like cockroaches in the light, scrambling for cover behind vehicles and homes. Bullets ricocheted off the ceramic armor.

Yuffie had hoped for a few more minutes of panic and chaos.

She scanned her surroundings and searched her backpack. Infrared goggles, nineteen smoke bombs, an incendiary grenade, two kunai, a large throwing star, a thermal-camouflaged tarp, and a half-eaten coldcut sandwich. She had forgotten all about the sandwich. It had an unpleasant, fishy odor, but she pushed it back into the bottom of her backpack—who knew when it might come in handy?

Yuffie slipped on the infrared goggles and draped herself in the tarp. She threw open the hatch above and tossed every smoke bomb she had into the air. With a final kick to the tank crew chief, she leapt out of the tank. So thick was the smoke, she would have seen nothing if not for the orange and red outlines of heat signatures visible through the goggles. Four yellow and red blips ran from the gaping façade of Aerith's house. They disappeared one by one into the ground. That was how Yuffie knew where the manhole was.

Yuffie removed the infrared goggles and crawled down the ladder, closing the manhole above her head, all before the smoke cleared.

She couldn't miss the glower that Cloud gave her as she walked past.

"_That_ was your plan?" Cloud said.

"It worked didn't it?" Yuffie said.

"_That!_ Was your plan?"

"Look, I'll steal you a bigger and better bike next chance I get, okay? I'll even throw in a few naked pictures of Tifa."

Cloud didn't answer, but the intensity of his glare died down a bit.

"I'm right here, you know!" Tifa reappeared.

Aerith, and a quivering Elmyra un-vanished a second later.

Tifa's headset sparked to life. It was Barret. "_Are you okay? The Public Safety chatter says they lost all of you. They don't know if you ran away or got got blown up or squished under rubble. Where you at?_"

"The sewer right under Elmyra's house," Tifa said. "Where are you?"

"_Head down the southwest corridor about a quarter mile. I'm with Cid, Wedge, and Biggs._"

"Cait Sith?"

"_The robo-cat bought the big one in the decoy van. Haven't heard from his handler._"

"They knew my name," Tifa said. "They weren't supposed to know my name. Cait Sith said Cloud was the only one they'd ever ID'd."

Cid's voice joined the radio. "_Yeah, he works for Shinra somehow, but Cait Sith always admitted he couldn't access all of their communication channels. I guess he didn't know._"

The bubble of emotion expanding within Elmyra burst. "Who are you people! Aerith, tell me what's going on! Shinra soldiers break into my house and wake me up from my own bed! They ask me all these questions about you. They blow up my house…"

"That was actually me," Yuffie said. "Sorry."

Elmyra stopped and stared. "Are you really AVALANCHE?"

"They're here to help us, Mom," Aerith said. "And they are AVALANCHE. Shinra kidnapped me and they came to help."

Elmyra's eyes narrowed. "Shinra kidnapped you?"

Aerith nodded.

Her tired old face seemed to age further as it saddened in that moment. "So this day finally came…"

Aerith tilted her head.

"We need to get out of here," Tifa said. "It's only a matter of time before they figure out where we went."

"Right," Yuffie said. "At least the smoking building was good enough cover to trick them for a while. You should have seen the four of you walked right past 'em out the front door!"

Cloud's eyes narrowed. "What?"

"You know, I saw you all leave the building after I blew the smoke bombs."

"Are you blind, Yuffie?" Cloud said. "I was in the middle of the street, remember? The minute you blew up the house, I was already half-way down the manhole."

Yuffie's eyes widened. She dropped the infrared goggles across the bridge of her nose. In the space behind Aerith, she saw a fifth human-shaped heat signature. It raised its hand at her.

"Down!" Yuffie yelled.

* * *

Reno limped to his feet. "I said, where's the newbie? Where's Valentine? I haven't seen him all morning."

Tseng brushed a fine layer of powdered drywall off his jacket. "Vincent has a special mission."

Rude stood, coughing. "Someone make the bells in my head stop ringing!"

"Giving the Newbie a special mission? What's up with that, Tseng?" Reno said. He was still upset. Maybe in a few hours, he would be over getting shot repeatedly.

"I've been wondering his deal anyway," Elena said. "He's odd. He doesn't talk to us. Doesn't hang out with us. It's like he thinks he's better than us or something."

"He's a specialist of sorts," Tseng said, helping Elena to her feet. "You all are here because when you joined Public Safety, you were found to have special aptitude. You were more than your average recruit. Vincent's the same. No one knows where he came from, but he signed up about six months ago. Didn't seem to have a care in the world. He didn't say a thing about who he was or why he wanted to join Public Safety, but his ability to use materia is off the charts. He's got the marksmanship of a veteran sniper. Heideggar didn't know what to do with him. So I gladly took him."

"So are you saying he's just been jacking off somewhere while AVALANCHE smokes us?" Reno said.

Tseng smirked. "No. He's our second trump card."

* * *

The gunshot was unbelievably loud, echoing through the mason chambers of the sewer. Yuffie fell, struck in the shoulder. Another salvo struck Cloud in the leg.

The recoil of each gunshot sent ripples of disturbance across the failing vanish spell. His gleaming red eyes materialized next. He was clad in the navy blue of the Turks.

Cloud drew his blade and struggled to rise. He swung wide at Vincent's gun hand. The buster sword clanked, metal-on-metal. Vincent's sleeve fluttered to the watery ground below.

Cloud flinched. Vincent smirked. A silvery mechanical arm clasped the blade of the buster sword and tossed it away.

In the confusion, Aerith had failed to notice Vincent's distinctive presence, but the violent flicker and squeak of his aura overwhelmed her as he grasped her across the collar bone.

Vincent dashed backwards.

"Aerith!" Tifa cried. Then she disappeared around a corner.

By what inhuman power he was able to hoist her across his shoulder and sprint through the water and slick brick of the sewer, Aerith did not know. She knew when they first met, whatever Vincent Valentine was, it was something other than human.

Aerith struggled. He held tighter. The sounds of her companions' cries died away. Aerith was aware only of the echoes of splashing water with each feathery-light footstep. Her heart beat harder with ever pace.

"You have nothing to fear," he said in a voice that was surprisingly deep bouncing through the sewer. "Or not much. You were just a flower girl before. Now you'll return to Shinra tower an accomplice to terrorists. No. You're the lucky one. Your friends have no chance of escape. They'll be dead within the week."

Aerith froze, shocked. It was as though he had responded to a thought she had not dared articulate. "Do you have any idea what you're doing?"

"I know quite well, Aerith Gainsborough." He chuckled. "The last Cetra indeed."

Aerith closed her eyes and tried to re-center herself; rediscover her location in the world. It was all she could do to remain calm and sane in moments in which she had no control.

Those moments were coming with greater frequency.

She felt her before she heard her. And then pattering footsteps rounded a corner through a side pipe. Tifa's legs swiped away his and he tumbled to the ground.

Aerith rolled and fell hard against a wall. Groaning, she tried to stand. She focused on the sight ahead, of Tifa rushing Vincent.

He was still prone on the ground when he spun and his gun sounded. A flash of crimson sprayed the wall.

Tifa tumbled back—fell against the sewer floor. He approached her—lowered the gun to her face.

"So you're the one from last week," Vincent said. "That was just a graze a moment ago. I think you're the first one who's ever survived a direct shot to the chest from Cerberus."

The three-barreled revolver cocked.

Tifa's eyes flashed. Aerith had never seen anyone move so fast in her entire life. Tifa kicked the gun away as it reported and landed a punch to his midsection. Vincent looked as though he had himself been shot. A flurry of hands and feet connected with him across his torso and he stumbled back. He aimed hastily at Tifa and fired. She had already taken a path to his center and deflected the weapon. She grabbed him across his shoulder and threw him against the wall.

Aerith rose to her feet and felt it: What little was human-like about Vincent began to peel away. The crimson of his eyes changed from uncanny to unreal.

He was changing.

He lowered his eyes as Tifa hovered over him. Aerith recognized the glimmer of his intent and clasped her own materia.

"Tifa!" Aerith cried.

The barrier activated in front of Tifa, shielding her like a wall. It happened less than a second before Vincent's spell fired. A bright flare of light flashed at Tifa and deflected back upon its caster.

Vincent cried a horrible cry, surrounded by swirling orange flame. He tumbled to a shallow puddle of water, splashing and patting at his singed suit, throwing himself to the floor. Tifa approach him once more. He looked up to her and that was the last thing he saw.

Tifa punched him in the face.

Footsteps scurried into the chamber and through the dim light of cracks in a manhole above, Aerith saw Cloud, Yuffie, and Elmyra approach, joined a moment later by Cid, Barret, Wedge, and Biggs.

Cloud limped to Tifa's side; ripped a corner of his shirt to bandage the deep graze across her shoulder.

Tifa nodded to Aerith. "Yuffie taught you about protective spells the day before yesterday?"

"It was a very long day," Aerith said.

Elmyra hugged Aerith. "Are you alright?"

Aerith returned the hug. In that moment, aware of her body against her mother's, she finally understood: she was no longer the same woman who had last seen her two weeks before. "I'm fine." She turned to AVALANCHE and pointed to the half-unconscious Turk. "He started to talk. He said you'd all be dead within the week."

Barret cursed. "We figured it'd be tough getting her away from the Turks, but all this bullshit was a motherfuckin' trap. Spike told me about the platoon of Public Safety goons and the tank. They was waitin' for us to make our move and wanted to get us all. They didn't get us, but…"

"You've been lured out of Sector Seven." Vincent's eyes were closed, but his lip twisted up.

"Yuffie, make sure he ain't got a wire or any more weapons on him," Barret said.

"Right." Yuffie approached tentatively. She tied his hands with a bundle of fabric, never letting her eyes leave his mechanical arm. She patted him down. Elmyra turned away and blushed at the thoroughness of her search.

Cid turned and cursed. "You know what this means, right? We can't go back there."

Barret punched the brick sewer wall. "Marlene!"

The next five minutes were unbearably quiet. Tifa and Cloud tended to each other's injuries. Aerith joined. Wedge and Yuffie mumbled to each other over Vincent. Cid and Barret paced. Elmyra watched on from a corner in silent desperation. Everyone was occupied with something.

Everyone except Biggs. He crouched on the ground, staring off into the darkness of a parallel corridor. "I can get her."

Barret turned. "What?"

"I can get her. I can get Marlene."

"It's too dangerous," Tifa said. "Someone might recognize you."

Biggs smiled sadly. "No one ever recognizes me. I haven't been on any missions where I'd be spotted. I might be able to slip under the radar. I can try to get her to the safe house."

Wedge watched Biggs with wide eyes.

"We'll meet up again eventually," Biggs said. He tried not to cry. "I'll take care of her, Barret."

Barret turned away and sniffled.

"You should go too, Ms. Gainsborough," Tifa said. "You're not going to be safe going back home now."

Elymra turned to Aerith. "We'll go together, won't we?"

Aerith finished tending to Cloud's leg and looked over her shoulder. She caught Tifa's eye.

"Won't we, Aerith?"

"Mom… I…"

Elmyra shook her head. "No. I already lost you once. I won't do it again!"

Aerith stood and approached her. "Mom, I love you. Nothing will change that. Nothing will ever change that. But as long as I'm with you, you won't be safe. You know… You know that now."

Elmyra hugged her daughter and for all anyone knew it could have been for the last time. "Shinra's been watching us and listening to us for a long time. At least two years. I never wanted to frighten you so I never..." She sniffled. "I didn't realize… I'm so sorry. If only you'd known…"

"It's not your fault, Mom. It's not."

"Find out why. You need to find out why…"

They held each other. All Aerith could think about was the dripping of water and the stench of mold. It made their parting feel unreal. She held her mother until she could hold her no more.

Biggs looked up and heard clattering of feet overhead on the street. "We need to go, Ms. Gainsborough…"

Elmyra wiped her eyes, adjusted her head, and nodded. "Right." She straightened Aerith's shirt. "Don't forget to eat your vegetables. And stay away from strange men. Don't trust the Shinra types. I knew your relationship with that Zack boy was doomed from the…"

"Mom…"

"Right… I love you…"

Aerith wanted to speak. She wanted to say just the right words, but those words never came, no matter how long she thought after her mother and Biggs disappeared into the sewers.

Yuffie pointed to Vincent. "What do we do with him?"

Barret raised his own mechanical arm. Servomotors whined and gears turned. The hand retracted and the barrel of a gun emerged from the cavity of his arm. "Like we would any other trash…"

Tifa stepped in front of Vincent. "No. Don't do it, Barret."

"Are you fuckin' crazy, Tifa?" He would have killed you. He would have killed Cloud. He would have killed Yuffie." Barret waved his arm at Aerith. "He would have kidnapped _her_."

Aerith narrowed her eyes. She didn't like being "_her_."

"If we kill a Turk we'll be in worse shape than we are now," Tifa said.

Barret laughed and it was a frightening laugh. They tried to kill us with a motherfuckin' tank. How does it get worse than that? How?"

"He's obviously important," Tifa said. "If we keep him as a hostage, that will give us leverage." In truth, it was a good thing she had not recounted everything that had happened inside the Gainsborough house.

Tseng told her to go ahead and kill the last Turk hostage she had taken.

Barret glowered. "I get it for real. You're over this, ain't you? You're over us? We take you in for two years. Give you shelter. A home. And you burn out on us and this is what happens? You've lost your fire. If you ain't got the balls to do this no more, let me do it for you. Now stand back and step away from him."

Tifa remained still.

Barret leveled his gun arm at Tifa. "I said, step away, you…"

Aerith stood in front of Tifa.

Cloud had already drawn his sword and held it at Barret's neck.

"That's how it is, huh, Spike?" Barret said.

Yuffie watched with wide eyes.

"It's nothing personal," Cloud said.

"What the hell are you crazy sons of bitches doing?" Cid cried. "You tryin' to do Shinra's job for them?"

Cloud and Barret lowered their weapons.

"She's got a point, Barret," Cid said. "We strip search him. We make sure he ain't got a tracking device on him. Then we take him with us. That should give us some cover. We can't leave him here. He's heard too much. And like hell I want to fuck with the Turks any more today."

Barret walked away and grunted against the wall. "This time, Lockhart. This time…"

Tifa relaxed. She leaned against Aerith.

"Where do we go now?" Yuffie said.

"We need to get out of Midgar," Cid said. "Until we get a better plan, we need to find someplace safe. We should go see Old Man Tellah in Kalm."

* * *

The commotion of helicopters and armored personnel carriers traveling in and out of the neighborhood frightened any bystanders who had not fled as soon as the smoke died. Tseng delegated managing traffic and fielding questions from brave bystanders to Lieutenant Antilles. Tseng had a generally good relationship with the Public Safety regulars, but he had a feeling he would be in the dog house for a while after today.

The older he grew, the less he cared about some things.

Elena finished talking to the corporal in charge of a reconnaissance squad and ran to Tseng. "It's been two hours. He isn't coming back, is he?"

Tseng looked up from his blueprint of the sewers and grimaced. "Lieutenant Antilles' men found some of his clothing in the sewer. He was there, but they're gone now. AVALANCHE must have taken him. Pity. I was sure Vincent could pull it off."

"Does President Shinra know?"

Tseng shrugged impassively. "I got off the phone with him a few minutes ago."

"Are they going to fire you like they fired Heideggar?" Elena said.

"They didn't fire him," Tseng said. "They took him down to the brigg and killed him."

Elena's eyes widened. "Tseng…?"

Tseng shook his head. "Calm down. Everything's under control."

Reno approached, still irritated. "Under control? We just lost a man, blew up a small neighborhood, and let AVALANCHE get away and it's 'under control?'"

Tseng gave Reno a cool glare. "It may not feel like it, but the more they do to get away from us, the deeper they're falling into our grasp. I wish we could have taken them into custody today, but they're drawing out the inevitable. It's already game, set, and match. The trap has already sprung and they've been caught. They just don't realize it yet."


	8. Chapter 8: Genesis

**8**

**Genesis**

It wasn't exactly a maintenance shaft—more like the hollowed out space between two large maintenance shafts. Cloud knew Barret would have trouble fitting through the corroded hole in the steel floor, but it was the only way Cloud knew to get in. Aerith, Tifa, and Yuffie slid through the dank access way with little difficulty while Cloud shone his flashlight on the rocky ground beneath. Cid ambled through with a grumble. Wedge kicked down a bound Vincent Valentine, stripped to his unmentionables. Barret had to squeeze through.

"Here we are, boys and girls," Cloud said.

It was cooler and darker. A thick black enshrouded them. They were no longer in the sewers. That much was clear.

"Where are we?" Tifa's voice echoed.

Cloud shone the flashlight at Tifa's feet. "Careful."

Tifa balked. She had been standing less than three feet from a dropoff into an even deeper black.

"What kind of place is this?" Yuffie said.

Cloud illuminated a wall nearby: crumbled and broken, wrought of pale ceramic and clay. It had a long-since hollowed window. Another similar wall stood nearby.

"It's a building?" Yuffie said.

Barret kicked another ceramic wall nearby, testing its constitution. "It's a city."

"A really really old one," Cloud said. "And it's all around us."

Cid grunted. "I'd heard legends Midgar was built on some kinda Cetra ruin. I guess it's true."

"How the hell you know about it, Spike?" Barret said.

Cloud gave Aerith a sideways glance—no more than an acknowledgement. "Zack showed it to me. We were on leave one weekend and he wanted to show me this quiet place he knew of."

Aerith blinked.

Cloud aimed his flashlight into the black. "There's an old SOLDIER training base not far from here. There should be some sea rations and water there."

"You remember we don't want Shinra to find us, don't you?" Cid said.

"They won't," Cloud said. "It was abandoned before I joined. Zack knew about it though. I don't know if anyone else alive does. I don't even know if Rufus Shinra knows."

"How did Zack know about it?" Aerith said.

"He was recruited by one of the first SOLDIERs: a man named Genesis Rhapsodus. He wanted Zack in an offshoot of SOLDIER. It was a top secret project no one really knew much about. Because it was based down here, they called it…"

"Deepground," Aerith whispered.

All of AVALANCHE stared.

Aerith blushed. "Zack told me about it."

"I thought you said he didn't talk about work much," Yuffie said.

Those who knew Aerith less well may not have recognized her glare. "He told me a little bit about it. I don't know the details."

Cloud's eyes narrowed. "We'd better go. It's about a mile's walk. We can rest there. A little further and there's an outlet just outside gate seven."

"Old man Tellah could pick us up around there," Barret said. "I can give him a call when we get out. He's got a truck."

"Shinra could be listening," Tifa said.

"Well you're right," Barret said. "We're gonna have to fuckin' get over it. Otherwise we're stuck down here forever."

One by one, they followed Cloud down a long, dark road of gravel and dust.

"Say, Aerith," Tifa said. "Do you wonder if a long, long time ago, your ancestors lived here?"

Aerith opened her mouth to speak. Being in this place, presented with a new memory of Zack, she had questions to ask Cloud. He walked past her. She followed without a word.

Wedge prodded Vincent along. Tifa turned to watch. He seemed unperturbed by Wedge's roughness. His eyes narrowed to slits. He was in another time. Another place.

Yuffie blinked. "What happened to Zack in SOLDIER? Who's this Genesis? Hey! Wait up guys!"

* * *

As he finished dropping off a report to Rufus Shinra, who was observing a SOLDIER training drill, Tseng heard Reno's voice: unusually loud and braying. His voice had had that particular tone about it since the incident in Sector Five.

"Reno, I told you not to make a scene!" Elena said.

"This asshole says he can put me in a box, I'd just like to see him try."

Tseng rounded a corner. The donuts sat on a table just outside of the Level 49 training ground. Tseng would never forget that room even if he lived a hundred years.

Tseng recognized SOLDIER Second Class Kunsel. He saw him form time to time. He saw a lot of them from time to time and it always sickened him to the stomach.

Kunsel held his sheathed sword, ready to draw.

Tseng spoke in a crisp staccato. "Reno! Kunsel!"

Elena flashed Tseng a concerned look. Reno barely acknowledged his presence. Kunsel ignored him outright.

"You have no right to say that about SOLDIER, 'research' grunt."

"You ain't no better than me. You SOLDIERs bleed like the next man."

"Reno, let him have the donut," Elena whispered.

"Elena, I've been waiting three days for a good cream filling and I'm not gonna let this punk take that away."

His mood had yet to improve since getting shot.

Kunsel laughed. "Just face it. Peons like you don't stand a chance against SOLDIER."

"At least I didn't need to become some kinda science experiment so I could fight."

Kunsel drew his sword. "Alright. Put up or shut up!"

Tseng caught the pommel of Kunsel's sword and placed himself in front of Reno. "I said, that's enough!"

Reno's eyes caught Tseng and softened. "Yeah. Sorry, boss."

"Let's go, Reno," Elena said.

Elena led Reno by the arm down the hall until he shrugged away her grasp.

Tseng turned to follow.

Kunsel sheathed his sword. "That could have been fun. Too bad his daddy had to show up."

Tseng grimaced and turned. After the loss of General Sephiroth, no one had been able to keep the SOLDIERs' arrogance in check.

And few alive still remembered Genesis.

Tseng made sure no one else could hear before he spoke. "If you had any idea what SOLDIER's made you become, you'd lose that cockiness fast."

Tseng ignored Kunsel's angry protests and walked away.

* * *

Aerith was afraid. She tried to awaken, but realized she was not in a dream. Not a real dream at least.

He perched on the rocky edge of a cliff. After the chaos he wreaked upon Mideel she would have never imagined him so quiet; so calm. He turned, silver hair flashing in the ambient light of the vast cityscape below. It was ambient light so bright, it could only come from one place in the world.

He stood on a cliff over Midgar.

"Who are you?" he said. For once, Aerith could make out the cat-eye slit of his eyes. "Speak!"

Aerith's throat caught. At least it would have had she been speaking from a physical throat. "You can see me?"

He was looking towards her, but his eyes would not focus. "I can sense you. This is the second time."

"You're General Sephiroth. Aren't you?"

He settled and his aquamarine glare cooled like embers in water. The spark of his ferocity gave way to a new emotion. Was it loneliness? "I am nothing. Neither General Sephiroth nor Jenova. An amalgam. Once very much like you… I sense. An abomination."

Aerith did not speak.

He smirked. "Are you surprised? I cannot see you—the real you. But my mind's eye can. We have the same eyes. I will know you when I see you. Soon."

"What is this Jenova? I've heard that word so many times. So many people speak it as though it should mean something to me, but it doesn't."

"Jenova was the harbinger of Omega Weapon; a weapon of last resort created by your ancestors to combat the Calamity from the Sky. Shinra's Professor Hojo awakened her in Nibelheim. I, Sephiroth, destroyed her physical body. Now what little exists of her heart resides within me."

"How can you be doing this? Doing this to your own world?"

"Because it is my world. It is half my world. It is half your world. You are so young but you must hear the screams of the planet. You must know its pain, half Cetra."

Growing up in an electrified, air-conditioned home in the heart of the city, Aerith was aware of that deepest, strangest contradiction within her heart. "I can."

"Choose your side then. I was chosen to destroy the ancient enemies of Gaia. Burn with them if you like."

Aerith awakened with a start. She sat upright, disoriented from the dream and the near pitch black of her surroundings. She was in the lost city beneath Midgar. The ceramic structures had given way to the stainless steel and iron of a SOLDIER outpost. She was in a barrack deep underground, lying on a torn sleeping bag found in a dusty old locker.

Cid turned to her, shocked. It was his shift to watch Vincent. He sat near the other sleeping bags, watching over Vincent by the light of a pale blue florescent lamp. Its flickering light cast long shadows from tables, chairs, and abandoned medical equipment.

He had spent time here. He had lived here for a short time. Unable to discern whether it was a vision or her imagination, Aerith felt the ghost of Zack Fair. The residual life force of people long-since gone resonated uneasily in this unreal place.

Bound and half-naked on the ground, Vincent watched her with unblinking red irises.

She was never able to get back to sleep.

* * *

The following day, they emerged into blinding light. It seemed like a bright, hot midday, but after their eyes adjusted, they realized it was nearly twilight. The beat up red truck was waiting for them about a half-mile from the gate by a bed of rocks.

Tellah was an old man with fishbowl glasses, wild white hair and a tank top. It revealed that he had once had substantial muscles, but the droopy exposed skin indicated that had been long ago indeed. He was a man who had lived a long, hard life. Of that there could be no question.

He and Barrett nodded to each other and bumped their fists into the air.

"The man hasn't found you yet," Tellah said. "Don't be a stranger, Barret my man."

"Wouldn't think of it."

"How long has it been? Three? Four years? We haven't sat down for a beer since Corel."

"Something like that."

"You used to live in Corel?" Yuffie said.

"Old Man Tellah's seen some stuff," Barret said. "He came before all y'all." Barret pointed to the tote bags they found in Deepground and loaded with rations. "Where can I put all this shit?"

"Throw it in the back of the truck wherever it'll fit. Anyway… I've been an old man for a long time," Tellah said. "He's giving me too much credit."

"He did put the idea of AVALANCHE in my head. You work for Shinra all your life and they screw you over like that? Ain't right."

"You worked for Shinra?" Yuffie sounded incredulous.

"I helped build that reactor there back in my day," Tellah said. "I was pensioned and watching a story on TV when it imploded. I can't remember what…"

"I slept in that mornin'." Barret said. "The only mornin' I was ever late for work. My best friend wasn't so lucky."

"Where's the munchkin?" Tellah said.

Barret grimaced. "Someplace safe. We gotta do this alone. I can't have her runnin' from the man the rest of her life. Dyne'd kick my ass in the afterlife." He turned to his companions. "Don't think you ever met Cloud, Tifa, Yuffie, and Wedge in person."

Tellah nodded a hello. "How you doin' Cid?"

Cid scratched his head. "Could be better."

"No kidding. I've been following it in the news. Heard you lit up a whole city block. Blew-up some old maid's house."

Aerith tried to suppress righteous indignation. "She was my mother."

He seemed startled by Aerith's presence. "Uh… is she okay?"

"Homeless, but otherwise fine."

Tellah adjusted his spectacles and observed Aerith head-to-toe. "She's not rank and file, is she?"

"She followed Tifa home and she kept her," Barret said.

Tellah sighed. "Civilians…"

Vincent chuckled. Wedge nudged him with the butt of his rifle.

Tellah scowled at Vincent, stripped to his boxers and an undershirt. There was a coat around the nylon cord binding his hands behind his back. "And who would this be?"

"One of the Turks," Barret said.

Tellah jumped. "Mother Minerva! You didn't tell me you'd taken a Turk hostage! Are you insane?"

"Look, he's clean," Barret said. "We checked him head to toe. He ain't got no transmitter or bug or nothin'. He's our bargaining chip in case things go south and if he gets to be a liability, we off him. That simple."  
Tellah s expression hardened. "Playing with fire again, aren't you Barret?"

"What else is new."

Tellah seemed to contemplate for a minute or two how best to respond. Finally, he laughed. "If we're going down may as well go down in a big fireball!"

Aerith and Tifa exchanged worried looks. Apart from having lived a hard life, it was quickly apparent Tellah was not all together either.

Tellah and Barret spent the next several minutes loading the AVALANCHE members and their hostage onto the overcrowded pickup. It sputtered to a start with effort.

As they drove off, Aerith looked skyward and, for about five minutes, wondered if she saw a black dot in the sky… following them.

* * *

The following morning, the smoky, savory smell of bacon permeated the little cottage on the edge of Kalm. Aerith awoke on the couch and watched Tifa, humming as she puttered about through the kitchen. Aerith sat upright and tossed aside the blankets covering her.

"Where did you learn how to cook anyway?" Aerith asked.

Tifa turned. Aerith realized she was unused to being watched unaware. "The servants mostly," Tifa said. "My father was like a lot of men of privilege. He didn't know anything about cooking or cleaning or how to take care of a home… or raise a daughter. They were nice enough to me. Mostly poor women from the country around Nibelheim."

"Female companionship must have been a rare treat."

"I was the mayor's daughter. I had a few friends who were girls, but we weren't very close. I didn't know the first thing about being a woman. I spent a long time acting the way I thought people expected me to act. And then when I got tired of that, I ran off to the mountains. I don't do anything half-way." Tifa smiled. "Help me set the table?"

"Okay."

Aerith followed Tifa to the file cabinet in which Tellah curiously kept his silverware. Neither had made sense of the strange logic of object placement in the old brick and log house. Someone had nailed a cuckoo clock to the outside wall—upside down. A bathroom plunger rested by the fireplace and a stack of firewood near the toilet. The cast iron skillet was in a floor panel under Tellah's bed and he insisted it be returned there after being used and re-seasoned.

Aerith set the table with care. She steeled herself for the conversation she had been avoiding for more than a whole day. "I'm so sorry. All of this is my fault."

Tifa paused. The muscles in her shoulders tensed and then relaxed. "That's life. I don't know how much longer we really could have gone on living like that. No matter what happens next; whether or not we make it out of this alive, AVALANCHE is through."

"Do you think you'll ever be able to forgive me?"

"Done already. Seriously. I'd be more worried about Barret than me. But that's okay. I'm on his black list now too."

"I didn't mean for you to be."

Tifa stopped mid-way through setting the bacon on a bone china plate. "He was right, you know. Tseng? The leader of the Turks? He was trying to rattle me and he hit me right where it hurt. I can't… I can't keep on doing what we were doing. I can't keep on living that way. Do you know how much it kills me to know how many lives we've probably ruined?"

"Tifa…"

"I just wanted justice and I got in over my head. I…" She wiped her eyes. "I became a monster, Aerith…"

Aerith approached and Tifa drew back. Tifa dried her eyes and looked away. Aerith puzzled over the push and pull of her aura: its attraction and repulsion.

"I'll never be able to tell Cloud…" Tifa started.

The floorboard by the guest room door creaked. Aerith and Tifa turned with a start.

Barret met them with a dark, pithy glare.

Tifa opened her mouth to speak, but only croaked.

"Where's my materia, anyhow?"

Tifa, Aerth, and Barret turned to Tellah.

"Huh?" Barret said.

Tellah idled past them, pressing his palm to his forehead, lost in deep thought. "You know. My materia. The one I had back in Correl. I can't remember exactly what it did or what I used it for, but it was pretty powerful and pretty important, wasn't it?"

Aerith scratched her head.

Barret grimaced. "Breakfast up?"

"Yeah," Tifa grumbled.

* * *

Wedge sneered at Vincent. His uncanny eyes alone stood out from the dim light cracking through wooden planks in the woodshed by Tellah's cottage. It was a sparsely populated part of a town. Even the main house was not within any but the longest earshot.

Someone had to miss breakfast with the others to tend to the hostage, but that did not mean Wedge had to like it.

"Not so tough are you now?" Wedge said.

Vincent, bound and silent, rested against the wall: predatory eyes watching Wedge.

Wedge paced back and forth. "Ever hear of a woman named Elfe?"

Vincent stared, unblinking.

"You should have. She used to lead AVALANCHE. She joined up after Shinra burned down her hometown. One of you Turks put a bullet in her head while she was washing her hands in the lady's room at the Sector Six train station." He clenched his fists. "Does it ring a bell now?"

Vincent continued his blank stare.

"You can never find a rock-bottom low, can you? She was my cousin."

Vincent looked away.

Wedge kicked Vincent. "I'm talking to you, jerk-off! How do you like that?" Wedge kicked Vincent again.

Vincent splayed across the floor.

Wedge popped his knuckles. "I hope you enjoy this. I sure will. You're stuck here for the next hour with me. And your precious Shinra's never going to come for you."

Wedge tried to kick again. Vincent was on his feet before Wedge could react. The glimmer of his red eyes became a glow. Vincent's form seemed to expand in the shadowy darkness. The sound of rope snapping preceded a prickly hand grabbing Wedge's jaw and hurling him against the wall.

Vincent spoke in a voice that did not seem to be his. "Listen, asshole. Shinra pays the bills, but I care as much for Shinra as I do any of you. I'm here now tied up on the floor only because I don't choose to escape now. If you touch me again, I will rip off your fucking leg and force-feed it to you along with a palm full of your own shit. Now. Tie me back up!"

Vincent disengaged and seemed to shrink. Literally. He knelt back down against the wall.

Wedge trembled as he complied.

* * *

Hate was too strong a word. He disliked her. He resented her. Tifa was not herself when they were together. He was even a little afraid of her—afraid of whatever strange powers she had—afraid of the way, when she looked at him, she seemed to stare clean through his soul. Even worse than his laundry list of dislikes were the pangs of attraction and desire. Maybe it came from her being Zack's girlfriend. The swoop of her long neck. The sway of her walk. The smell of her hair. Even Tifa rarely provoked such primal feelings of animal lust.

That was what Cloud thought. Aerith knew it. The thoughts flew straight from his mind to hers and she heard them as clearly as they had been spoken. Aerith turned. Cloud sat rigid, mako blue eyes wide, meeting hers. He knew.

Aerith sipped her orange juice and dodged Cloud's stare. It was quiet except for the tick-tocking of the cuckoo clock: the one inside the house and right-side-up. Breakfast in a country kitchen, surrounded by friends… sort of. It had the makings of a delightful morning. Except of course everyone in the room was a fugitive from the law with the possible exception of Tellah. If he was not, he should have been. Not many upstanding citizens held hostages in their woodsheds. He was an odd man. Yuffie was frightening in her own way. Tifa was a gentle, confused soul. Barret despised her. Cid… gave Aerith a strange vibe. As far as Cloud, not since Zack had she been able to hear another's thoughts so clearly and explicitly.

"It was three-thirty in the afternoon," Tellah said from the head of the table. He lowered his head, a ponderous look about his face. "Or was it eight-o-five in the morning? I can't really remember..."

"It was seven-forty," Barret said.

"Oh yes. And we hear the loudest sound I've ever heard in my life come from the reactor. I helped build that thing back in the day, you know."

"We know," Yuffie said. She was not good at masking her frustration.

"It was chaos for the next couple of minutes," Barret said. "It was anarchy for the rest of the day." He raised his mechanical arm.

"Didn't you say you weren't in the reactor that day?" Yuffie said.

"Didn't matter," Barret said. "The shockwave took down every damn building in the whole town. I was buried under my whole house. They had to amputate. My best friend Dyne was in the reactor. Poor Marlene's alive today only by the grace of the Goddess. She got caught under a pocket in the rubble and was stuck there for two days. Her mom died instantly. We hope."

"How did you survive, Tellah?" Yuffie said.

Tellah lowered his head. "I can't remember…"

Yuffie rolled her eyes. "Right."

"It was the end to a month of hell," Barret said. "There was some kinda leak in the reactor or somethin'. It wasn't puttin' out like it was supposed to. Folks were callin' in sick. We were pullin' sixteen hour shifts and the plant was runnin' at a hundred-ten percent power. Back then we was the main power supply for the Gold Saucer, you know. Fuckin' tourists…"

"And there was that incident…" Tellah said.

"A week before the blast, one of our guys had pulled a twenty-hour shift," Barret said. "He takes his gun into the plant and shoots twelve men. Four of 'em die. Then he blows his own head off. Didn't make any damn sense. You ask me, it was the leaking mako. Too much exposure and the stuff'll make you go batshit."

"Shinra says that's impossible though," Cid said. "I mean, it's the lifeblood of the planet, but it's just a myth it can do that to people."

"No, it's true," Cloud said.

"What about SOLDIERs then?" Cid said. "When you were being trained, you were soaked in the stuff for days on end."

"Skeptics always bring up SOLDIER," Cloud said. "It's true that we were exposed to pure mako. What people don't know is that the physical screening is rigorous, but the psychological screening is even more rigorous. A lot of recruits have the physical prowess to match a green SOLDIER, but very few can stand up to the emotional stress of the mako exposure." Cloud looked away. "Shinra's known for years that mako poisoning can induce psychosis."

Aerith heard the echo of a name in Cloud's mind. "This may not be related… What ever happened to Genesis Rhapsodus? You know? The man who vetted Zack for DEEPGROUND? Where is he now?"

Cloud scowled. _Stop doing that._ "He died. Years ago."

No one spoke. Finally, Cid cleared his throat. "Let's get down to business. We're in danger as long as we stay here. I spoke with a friend the other day. He's guaranteed us safe transport out of the Port of Junon."

Barret arched an eyebrow. "Shit. You want us to march right through the biggest Shinra garrison in the whole continent?"

"We don't have much choice. Anywhere on this whole continent, we're in danger. If we could make it to Wutai, we might be safe. Somewhere Shinra's got a short arm."

They discussed the operation for a while longer. Aerith was no longer paying attention. It was a strange phenomenon. The more she thought about the name, "Genesis Rhapsodus," the more a face… the more a scene materialized in her mind.

* * *

"'_There is no hate, only joy,_

_ For you are beloved by the goddess,_

_ Hero of the dawn,_

_ Healer of worlds,_

_ Dreams of the morrow hath the shattered soul._

_ Pride is lost,_

_ Wings stripped away, the end is nigh_…' Sephiroth."

The crimson-clad, crimson-haired SOLDIER blended into the walls of the holographic training simulator. The simulation ended, the once sterile projector walls flashed through smears of primal vermillion.

General Sephiroth swallowed. "Genesis? What have you done?"

"You're not listening to me again, Sephiroth! I hate that about you. Whenever I have something important to say, you pay too much attention to what I've said and not enough to what I mean."

A tall, muscular SOLDIER with spiked black hair stepped forward. "Tell me you didn't do this," Angeal whispered. "Please. By the love of the goddess…"

Genesis stood up from his corner. He braced himself against the wall for support and in the wake of his hand remained a print as dark as his hair.

Tseng, tall and stoic, now hovering timidly behind the SOLDIERs, could no longer fight the urge to vomit.

An official body count released a week later would list the death toll at one-hundred thirteen.

It had taken a while to tally. Most of the bodies were no longer intact.

Genesis cackled with glee. "Sephiroth. Angeal. You know I was just doing my job. It's my mission to stop monsters. That's why we SOLDIERs came to be." His face blanked. Its humor vanished. "We have to protect Mother."

Angeal shook. "Genesis… All of these Second and Third Class… They were just kids. They were our kids. You were supposed to train them! And this… Why?"

Genesis regarded Angeal's presence as incidental. "You think a little death will stop them? Nothing can stop them. Or Shinra. Not art. Not poetry. Not science. Not a fifty terawatt beam cannon in outer space. Not three-hundred ninety-four civilian casualties in Wutai. Maybe nothing but Mother herself."

"Genesis…"

"Do you know much about cuckoos, Angeal? It's an odd bird, you know. They don't brood their own eggs. They leave them in the nests of other birds for them to hatch. Birds aren't very smart and having hatched the eggs, they don't notice or care that this massive thing isn't of their own kind. They bring it food. They feed it and take care of it. And it gets bigger and bigger. It dwarfs the mother bird's own young and as it grows larger and larger, steals their food and pushes them out of their own nest to their deaths. And the mother bird will do nothing, believing it to be her own child."

Angeal glowered. "Genesis… you…?"

Genesis laughed. "Don't you get it? Where's your sense of humor, Angeal and Sephiroth? We're all cuckoo!"

Genesis' laughter stopped. In a flash of movement, Sephiroth impaled him on the Masamune.

Genesis gasped for air and wheezed. "Sephi…roth? Why? Don't you understand? You're the biggest cuckoo of us all!"

Sephiroth twisted the blade and sliced. One of Genesis' innards, which Tseng could not recognize, fell to the ground.

Genesis coughed up blood.

"'_My friend, the fates are cruel._

_ There are no dreams,_

_ No honor remains._

_ The arrow has left the bow of the goddess._

_My soul, corrupted by vengeance_

_ Hath endured torment, to find the end of the journey_

_ In my own salvation_

_ And your eternal slumber._

_Legend shall speak_

_ Of sacrifice at world's end_

_ The wind sails over the water's surface_

_ Quietly, but surely."_

Genesis reached his hand out towards Sephiroth—watched him through unfocused eyes. "'_Nothing shall forestall my return. Even if the morrow is barren of….'_"

Sephiroth sliced off Genesis's head. It bounced across the room and landed at Tseng's feet.

Tseng looked up to see the body slump to the ground, joining so many others: all but a handful of active duty SOLDIERs.

As the body crumbled, Tseng saw it: from Genesis back, uncurled a single sheet of dark leather: the matrix of a single black wing.

Tseng screamed.

* * *

"Tseng? I mean… sir?"

Tseng snapped to attention. He was stalled in the hallway, staring at that room number again. Unpleasant memories. "What? Elena?"

Elena nibbled her lower lip and wiped a strand of blond hair away from her eyes. "Sorry, sir. I wondered if you'd heard anything about AVALANCHE…"

Tseng shrugged. "They're going to Junon tomorrow."

"Junon? Why?"

"They think they're taking a ship to Wutai."

Elena nodded slowly. "Sir… I…?"

"Yes, Elena?"

Elena lowered her head. She seemed to sense now was not the right time. "Nothing sir. You seemed like you were thinking about something."

Tseng forced a smile. "Just remembering."

Elena stared. "Oh. Well… goodbye then." She walked along down the hall.

Tseng got along well with General Sephiroth until Nibelheim, but Sephiroth had never been the same after the incident with Genesis in the level 49 training room. Nearly every Second and Third Class had been killed. Their numbers had been replenished since then. Zack Fair, a promising Second Class, was promoted to fill the command vacuum. Away on a mission to Mideel, he was a rare survivor. After Angeal's disappearance, he and Sephiroth were the only ones left.

Tseng had been remembering, but he had also been thinking. He had realized something on that bloody day years before. He was not naïve. He knew full well that the mako used to power the world's infrastructure and imbibe SOLDIERs with their power was the very life force of the planet.

Something in that life force wanted them dead.

* * *

_A/N: Whew. It feels like a long time since the last update. I haven't been responding to reviews like I used to, but thanks to everyone who has been giving me feedback on the story! I appreciate all comments: positive, negative, or otherwise. It's been a big motivation to write._


	9. Chapter 9: Meteor

**9**

**Meteor**

Aerith's dream that night was a dream like none other: filled with hundreds of refracted images. Her surroundings and her own reflection multiplied into shards of the same shape and color without form, spinning and turning. Half kaleidoscope and half funhouse, Aerith fell into an infinity of shadows and light.

And then she saw the cascading silver threads of hair and mottled, leathery black. With them came the green of eyes. They were not her own. She knew this to be true for their streaks of color and feline slits.

He emerged from beyond the auburn of her hair, but to her eyes, it could have been the orange of hellfire. The serpentine figure glided across the deep brown carpet, past the dining room cuckoo clock. He hovered above her couch.

It was not a dream.

Aerith's eyes popped open with the alertness of having been awake but dreaming. He was in front of her, not a vision, but a flesh-and-blood man, if he could be called that. The tortured scream of his soul was inhuman.

In the near black of the night, the dark mass of his torso descended on top of her, crushing her abdomen. A leather-bound hand clasped her mouth. Through the binding of his body and hands, his touch burned. Her synapses fired a frenzy of distressed signals, all telling her the same thing: she needed to run. She needed to get away.

His voice rasped. "Where is it?"

Aerith flailed, her brain unable to focus.

"I need it and you must know where it is. I see you in my dreams. You see me in yours." He gripped her throat. "Where is the Black Materia? Where?"

Aerith's hands clasped feebly at his face. He refused to flinch but the bare skin on skin of their contact deepened their connection for fleeting seconds. She felt how her touch hurt him.

He could kill her. He would kill her. It was his destiny for she was his inverse. He was her own personal devil.

"This is your last chance. I will kill you, you know it. Your life means nothing to me."

His hand relaxed. "I don't know…" Aerith whispered. She resisted the tears, but they came nonetheless.

"Then I shall dismantle you. Before I have completely finished, perhaps you will tell me what I need to know."

"I don't know anything!"

"Then I will at least enjoy myself in the process…"

Aerith tried to scream. His right hand clenched her face and muffled her. His left clenched the mottled dress she slept in. It was one of her last possessions.

He ripped it down to her navel.

As Aerith struggled, she realized he balked. His eyes locked onto the pale, iridescent orb dangling from her neck, between her splayed breasts.

"Aerith!"

Sephiroth stood. Tifa Lockhart's bare foot glanced across his face. She punched and he caught one hand and then the other. Then he squeezed.

Tifa flinched. Her face masked intense pain.

"So… you live, Tifa Lockhart." Sephiroth smirked, but then he noticed a quirk of her expression; her eyes track something behind him.

He had not heard his approach. Sephiroth released Tifa's hands and leapt in time to evade the buster sword. Cloud sliced and thrust. Sephiroth drew the Masamune and parried. As he parried, Aerith realized, at four heads above Cloud, Sephiroth hovered in mid-air. An outreached hand and flick of his wrist and Cloud spun backwards, slamming hard into the log wall.

Cloud stumbled to his feet. "Sephiroth!" Aerith felt many emotions within Cloud. Hatred and fear ruled.

Sephiroth lifted higher towards the ceiling. "Are you going to run away again, Cloud?"

Cloud's voice crackled with frenzy as he screamed. He angled his sword across his face and charged.

Tifa turned. "Cloud, no!"

Sephrith raised his hand towards Cloud and then drew it to his chest, as though he pulled an invisible cord between the two.

Cloud gasped, yanked through the air. A moment later, he was impaled on the Masamune.

Tifa screamed.

Cloud gritted his teeth and grabbed the Masamune with his bare hands, pushing himself back along the length of the sword. Sephiroth watched, bemused, and chuckled. Cloud slid off the tip of the sword and landed with a dull thud onto the ground.

The sound of a Gatling gun reverberated through the small common room. It hurt Aerith's eardrums.

Sephiroth turned with a start and swooped across the room, skimming the wall. Tracer rounds followed. An enormous throwing star forced him to swoop higher. Barret stumbled into the living room, gun-arm raised. Yuffie followed. Cid came a moment later.

A black and silver flicker ascended to the sky like a rocket. Pieces of timber fell in his wake. He stopped in mid-air a hundred feet above.

Sephiroth raised his voice. He must have. Aerith could hear him as clearly and loudly as when he was two feet in front of her. "You may know nothing about the Black Materia, but that bauble of yours… I greatly desire that as well. If I need to, I will take it from your smoldering corpse."

The house began to crumble around them.

* * *

Sephiroth lifted high into the air. Through the opening in the roof, he could see the flower girl. He willed the building to collapse.

The calm and peace of the evening air enshrouded him: it's king and champion. It anticipated his command as did the silenced creaking of crickets and flow of the Lifestream.

It awaited his divine judgment.

Sephiroth felt the flow of mako through his body communicate with the plants; the flowers; the trees; the animals.

Kalm was quiet and tranquil. A few restless souls from a ways down the street awoke to the sounds of chaos in Tellah's home. Most rested peacefully. Wisps of glowing green crept through the earth, dancing across the face of the town.

Sephiroth clenched his fists.

Then he condemned Kalm.

The wisps of green exploded in sparks and flame.

Sephiroth closed his eyes. He felt the flames spread from grass to brush to homes to human flesh. Fire and screams reached his ears. Cruel rapture flooded his senses as the flames swept souls back to the life force from whence they came.

Sephiroth's eyes widened. Amidst the chaos and flame and death, he felt a strange flicker of life energy not far away. He swooped to the wood shed beyond Tellah's home.

* * *

Wedge prodded Vincent. "I said don't move."  
"Do you want us both to die? The town is burning. It's under attack."

"The hell's going on?" Wedge peeked through the cracks of the wall and watched the spread of glowing orange and green. He turned to Vincent. "You know, don't you?"

Vincent remained silent.

Wedge grumbled and stepped away from the wall. "I guess we're not good if we're dead, huh?"

Those were the last words he ever spoke.

A black and silver flash shattered the hardwood wall to his left. Silver flashed. Wedge's torso flipped over and away from his legs.

Sephiroth swung his sword. Centrifugal force splayed blood and gristle across the ground and wall.

He and Vincent Valentine met each others' eyes. They knew each other without having ever met.

"You have your mother's eyes," Vincent said.

Those monstrous eyes revealed surprise. "So you are…"

"I am."

"Why are you with these humans? A hostage. No, you did not oppose them. You are living as one of them."

"I was."

"How dare you condescend yourself?"

"You're one to talk. I am what you pretend to be."

"You obviously choose to share their fate." Sephiroth arched his hands into the air as the mako-induced flames outside rose higher: a conductor signaling a crescendo. "Can you not hear the sorrow of the planet?"

"I've had hearing problems for years."

Sephiroth lowered his hands. The roof fell. Splinters and timber fell On Vincent. Skin tore. Bones broke. Hundreds of pounds weighed upon him.

Sephiroth turned and walked out away through a sheen of fire. "My new world has no place for the deaf."

Flames and tickling, screaming wisps of green life crept in from the forest.

Vincent was trapped.

* * *

Kalm burned. Sephiroth stood at the center of its flaming purgatory, washed in searing heat and sparks; winds nearly hot enough to cook flesh. He smiled as the all-consuming flame spread. He laughed as points of life vanished in its wake.

And then from the house of AVALANCHE, silver blue light flashed.

Sephiroth turned. Two hundred feet away, ice crystals spread across every tendril of wood fiber and shattered. In the center of the house's skeleton, AVALANCHE crouched in a pocket of brittle, carbonized lumber. What little remained of the home crumbed away in the breeze. Through plumes of steam and smoke, he saw green eyes that matched his own; auburn hair and the tattered fabric of her torn dress blowing in the killing wind. Her arm glowed, the dying flicker of active materia.

Impossible. He channeled the spiritual core of the planet. No spell cast from common materia should have been able to nullify the force of his magic.

Cloud Strife was prone on the ground, possibly dying. Tifa sat by his side. The two older men and the Wutainese shinobi hovered nearby. Aerith Gainsborough stood. She was no longer afraid.

It was his turn to be afraid. "Who are you…?"

"I'm Aerith."

As she was now, she would be the death of him.

Sephiroth brought the Masamune to bear and angled it towards Aerith. He started to run. He ran faster and faster until his feet left the ground.

Light flashed. A concussion powerful enough to knock the wind out of him punched Sephiroth backwards.

Sephiroth looked up. It was not the half-Cetra, Aerith. She looked as surprised as he felt.

The bespeckled old man with wild hair and a beard of pure white approached. His bathrobe dragged across the dirt and ground.

Sephiroth stood. "What…?"

"Barret! Cid!" Tellah yelled over his shoulder. "The keys to the truck are under the floor board. Get out of here!"

Barret hobbled to his feet. "You crazy summabitch! What are you thinking?"

Tellah sneered. "This spoony bastard's mine!"

Sephiroth rose to his feet. Another spell flashed. Sephiroth parried it with the wave of his hand. "Your parlor tricks will not work on me again, old man."

Tellah closed his eyes in concentration. Materia glowed bright.

Sephiroth covered the hundred feet between them within a second.

Tellah would have slumped to the ground if not for the sword through his chest holding him up into the air.

The old, dying man chuckled. "I guess I couldn't do it in the end."

"A futile death is foolishness; not heroism."

He was still smiling. His materia still glimmered. "In that case, die Shinra asshole."

A strange current of energy flowed through the air. Strong negative energy interfered with his own. Mako sparked and flickered. Sephiroth sensed the presence of powerful magic.

What sort of materia was that anyway?

Light spread across the ruined town square of Kalm. It was not light from the glow of fire and mako.

It was a light from above.

Sephiroth looked up as orbs of luminous plasma showered from the heavens.

* * *

Cid ran his fingers through his hair, from golden blond tips to darkening roots. He watched the sky light up across the remains of the street. He saw the mako flames sputter and flicker. "What the motherfucker was that?"

Barret felt for more soft spots in the floor board. "Tellah was always messin' around with materia. Elemental crystals. Special 'potions.' He was into all that New Age shit. If he ain't alive, that motherfucker's gonna pay!"

"We've gotta get the hell out of here, Barret," Cid said. "Yesterday."

"Cloud's going to die," Tifa cried.

Cloud sat upright from the scalded remains of Tellah's home. "I'll be fine, Tifa," he said. And then he coughed up blood.

Aerith reached out to Cloud, concentrated on forging a mental connection.

Cloud snatched his hands away. "No."

"I'm going to save you," Aerith said.

Cloud's eyes were frantic. "You're not touching me!"

"This is only to help you," Aerith said.

"I don't care what it's for," Cloud said. "I'm not letting you do to me what you did to her."

Tifa gave Aerith a puzzled look. "Cloud… She's trying to save your life."

"Use your materia, Tifa," Cloud said. "Do it before it's too late. I won't let her… I won't let her…"

Aerith frowned and slid away.

Barret punched through the half-crumbled floorboard with his mechanical arm for the fifth time. "I've got it! I've got it!" He raised the truck keys into the air.

"Then let's get the hell out of Dodge!" Cid said.

Aerith caught sight of the smoldering wood shed. "Wedge! Vincent!"

"It's over," Cid said. "They ain't comin' out."  
Aerith stood and began to sprint.

Tifa was distracted from the process of casting a spell of healing only long enough to call out to Aerith once.

Aerith remembered the shed being right beside Tellah's house, but no distance that length had ever seemed so long. It could not have taken her much time to reach it, but in such a short span of time, so many thoughts had never raced through her head.

Nothing piqued whatever sixth sense she possessed quite like fresh death. She sensed when her foster father died. She sensed when her lover died. She sensed when every one of the hundred-plus souls in Kalm died. She felt the Lifestream increase in volume, as though growing large enough to swallow her whole.

The rain of fire and light from the Eastern sky would have blinded her if she had stopped to stare. She did not stop; would not stop. She knew he was still there. He was wounded, but still alive. His tormented soul screamed at a feverish pitch.

Within the burning shed, Aerith made out the peculiar energy signature of Vincent Valentine's soul. He was alone.

Biggs would be crushed.

Aerith concentrated on the ice materia in her grasp. She got lucky when she took notice and thought it strange that Yuffie kept a sack of materia under her pillow the night before. It had taken a few minutes to find it in the crumbling chaos of the house, but it had saved her life and maybe everyone else's lives.

Her ice spell smothered the shed. She maneuvered the spell carefully, weaving the crystallization of wood fiber around Vincent until the ambient cold of absolute zero smothered the last of the flames.

The wood crumbled. Vincent watched her with hot crimson eyes. Nothing human had eyes like that.

Human or not, he was injured badly, pinned beneath now-shattered timber; bleeding and broken.

Aerith reached out to him. "Take my hand."

Vincent scowled. "Shouldn't you run for your life?"

Aerith heard Tifa and Cid calling her name.

"Take my hand," Aerith said.

"You're a stupid and overly-trusting human."

"Take. My. Hand."

Vincent reached out and clasped her hand. She pulled him towards her and he grimaced.

Aerith slung his arm across her shoulder and hobbled towards the others. They had loaded into the back of Tellah's truck.

Tellah's spell ended. The place where he and Sephiroth stood smoldered.

She had never even gotten the chance to get to know the old man.

Aerith walked faster. Vincent hobbled after her. The surviving members of AVALANCHE beckoned her from the truck. This walk was even longer than the last.

Aerith pushed Vincent into the back of the truck and jumped in after. Without the bright lights from above, only the eerie red and green glow of Kalm burning illuminated their surroundings. It was hard to see. Aerith stumbled in after Vincent. She brushed against Barret. He was not happy. Not at all. She could tell that even before he spoke. And then he did speak.

"Why'd you bring him?" Barret said.

Cloud sat upright. He breathed uneasily. Tifa looked exhausted from the concentration of her healing spell. "Wedge didn't make it," he said.

Aerith shook her head.

Barret pounded the truck's bed with his mechanical arm. Just then, it lurched into gear. "Hang on tight!" Cid shoulted from the driver's seat.

They had to hold on tight. The truck's axle hopped across the dirt and uneven ground as it careened off far faster than it was meant to be driven on uncivilized roads.

Barret pointed at Vincent. "Why'd you bring him then? Why not just let Sephiroth finish the job? Less for us to worry about."

"We still have the toughest stretch of the trip," Tifa said. "We need that insurance."

Aerith did not make eye contact with Tifa. She would betray her lie.

"Once we're to safety, he's swimmin' in the bay of Junon," Barret said. "If he becomes a liability when we get there, you're dead, Lockhart."

Signs of life returned to Cloud's face. He bolted upright.

"AVALANCHE is over with, Barret."

They all turned to Yuffie, surprised to hear her speak.

"What?" Barret said.

"You heard me," Yuffie said. "It's over with. We lost half our numbers in two weeks. We had to flee Midgar. We're probably never going to be able to go back…"

Aerith's heart balked.

"And it'll be only by the grace of the Goddess if we make it off this continent," Yuffie said. "We're going to Wutai. You want to keep fighting Shinra from there? What's left of my clan would be glad to help. Like hell you'll be calling the shots though."

"What're you tryin' to say, Yuffie?" Barret said.

Yuffie smirked one of her dark, angry smirks. "You're not the boss of us anymore."

Barret's mechanical arm retracted. A gun barrel appeared. He aimed at Yuffie.

Tifa flipped to her bare feet, ready to pounce. Cloud, still battered and weary, grasped his sword. Yuffie crouched.

Barret looked left and right. "I can take out a couple-a-you before you get me. Wanna try? You think I got anything left to lose?"

"Marlene," Aerith said.

Barret turned.

"She needs a father, Barret," Aerith said.

Barret's eyes narrowed. "Don't gimme that. This is all your goddamn fault."

"I know," Aerith said. "I know. If there's some way I can make it right, I will."

Cid banged on the truck's rear window. "No shooting on the pickup truck, assholes! I'm tryin' to talk to my contact in Junon."

Barret continued his staring-contest for another minute. He blinked. He lowered his weapon.

Cloud's hard face softened. "We're just a bunch of folks on the run now, Barret. I'm sorry…"

Barret lowered his head and bawled.

Aerith felt Vincent flinch beside her. "You're hurt," she said.

Vincent grumbled.

Aerith pressed her hand to Vincent's face. She closed her eyes and focused her heart on forging a link between him and her.

Aerith felt herself drawn; pulled into him. It was a stronger feeling than with Sephiroth, but then, they had only touched. If the soul could experience physical pain, hers did in that moment.

Aerith found herself repelled back against the truck.

He rejected her psychic connection. A strand of the Lifestream bound all living things and resided in the souls of every man and woman Aerith had ever encountered.

Except Vincent.

Yuffie leaned back. "What the…?"

Vincent was smug. Too smug. "Just use materia."

In the driver's cab, Cid concluded his conversation with his "contact" in a low voice. "In about a day. Can you meet us…? Okay. Gotcha. … I know. Alright. I'll see you then, Cissnei." He hung up his PHS.

"What's the deal, Cid?" Yuffie said.

"There's this girl I met in Junon back in the day. She's an AVALANCHE sympathizer. She'll get us aboard that ship to Wutai."

"Can we trust her?" Yuffie said.

"I trust her more than just about anyone," Cid said.

Aerith stared absently behind as Cid drove them on the long road to Junon. She was aware of Cloud staring, but when she turned to look at him, he avoided her eyes and pretended to be looking elsewhere. Then Aerith remembered her torn dress was half-open down to her naval. She tried to secure the top of her dress without drawing too much attention to the act.

Aerith was not unique—she was not the only one whose sole article of clothing in the world was in disrepair. Yuffie read the situation reached into her backpack, and tossed out navy blue cloaks of a sheer material to the others. Aerith did not know for sure where she got them, but she seemed to remember them in Tellah's closet. Whether they had been taken before, during, or after the incident with Sephiroth, she did not know.

The faces around her were desperate, dirty, and bruised. The reality of all that had happened settled in and a sickening feeling overcame them in unison. Tifa slipped beside her. Aerith glanced at Vincent and then her. They carried out a brief conversation in looks and gestures.

"I don't want anyone else to die, Aerith," Tifa said. "I'm sick of all this death."

The last bright glimmer of Kalm disappeared behind the horizon. All that remained was a vanishing rose glow at the crest of the northern sky.


	10. Chapter 10: Reeve Tuesti

**10**

**Reeve Tuesti**

No one in Public Safety liked the port of Junon. It was dirty, dangerous, and smelly. Even knowing that, something smelled really, exceptionally bad.

"Ew, what _is_ that?" one of the guards said to the other.

The other guard pointed towards the cement wall across from the wharf. It was hard to see through the foggy night, but the moisture amplified every odor.

"Did someone die?"

"I don't know. I don't think so."

"If not, what the hell is it?"

They crawled over the jagged rocks; spoke over the crash of waves. "Like someone threw a pile of monkey shit all over the place."

A pause. "How do you know what monkey shit smells like?"

The other guard gestured to stop. He crouched. The scent was stronger; almost painful. "Hey man… you better have a look at this…"

The other guard blinked. "The hell?"

It was a cold-cut sandwich: discolored in a disconcerting way. At that distance, it smelled worse than death.

The guards prepared to speak when a pair of tranquilizer darts dropped them.

Yuffie chuckled as they twitched on the ground. "See, Boobs? What did I tell you? A true shinobi of Wutai isn't limited to a set number of weapons. The world is my weapon." She moved to retrieve the sandwich.

"Don't do it, Yuffie," Cloud said.

Yuffie frowned. "Aw?"

Tifa sighed. "You're such a dirtbag, did you know that?"

A silky female voice came from beyond the concrete wall. "I suggested you not make a ruckus. Will this really be okay?"

The surviving members of AVALANCHE and Vincent turned. A woman with rippled red hair wore the uniform of a Shinra customs inspector and carried a large duffle bag.

Cid smirked. "It's okay, guys. She's with me." He approached her, for a moment seeming unsure whether to hug her or shake her hand. He settled on a slight nod. "Cissnei, this is Cloud. Tifa. Barret. Yuffie. Aerith Gainsborough." He enunciated Aerith's name.

"Cissnei's" eyes turned to Vincent. They stared at each other. Neither spoke. She looked away first and offered a narrow-eyed smile to AVALANCHE. "Hello. You all have been busy."

"It's been a week," Cid said.

Cissnei's smile faded. "I heard on the news. Kalm…"

"What about it?" Barret said.

"There were no survivors," Cissnei said. "At all. Just you."

Aerith's heart balked for a moment. Barret pounded his fist against a rock.

"Where is he now?" Aerith said.

Cissnei turned to her. "No one knows."

"Shinra has a network of satellite surveillance," Cloud said.

"It must be like trying to find a needle in a haystack though," Cissnei said.

"She's right," Cid said. "They're designed for tracking large aircraft. Something the size of a human is way too small."

"The question is where will he strike next?" Cissnei said. "And no one knows the answer to that question."

Aerith did. Or at least she had a compelling suspicion. It would come wherever she was. She remembered his interest in her pendant, aware again of her own virtual nakedness below Yuffie's thin shroud.

"Fuck that," Barret said. "See if he makes it all the way to Wutai."

"Cid told me there was another one of you back in Midgar," Cissnei said. "He operated a mechanical cat?"

"Cait," Barret said. "We ain't heard from him since Sector Five. Never even met him in real life. For all I know he forgot all about us or he's dead in a ditch. Why?"

Cissnei shook her head. "Just wanted to make sure I had the right number of uniforms…"

Cissnei opened her duffel bag and tossed bundles of clothing all around. They all caught them and unraveled them except for Vincent—it bounced off of his chest. His hands were still bound behind his back.

"Naval uniforms?" Tifa said.

Cissnei nodded and pointed to the horizon. About a mile further along the dock sat an enormous freighter. "That's going to be your ticket out. The Big Whale. It's one of the largest ships in Shinra's commercial fleet. The crew has a high turnover. You're probably never going to be found out if you just play it safe." Her eyes drifted to Vincent again.

He had not been introduced to her as the hostage and she certainly did not know AVALANCHE by sight. She recognized him. Aerith was sure of it.

"Are there any shoes?" Tifa said.

Cissnei turned. "Excuse me?"

Tifa pointed downward. Her bare, dirty and bruised toes waggled.

Cissnei arched an eyebrow.

"We kind of left in a hurry, you know," Yuffie said.

Cissnei sighed. "This will take a few minutes…"

* * *

An old, borderline-overweight porter gave them a second glance. His eyes tracked them for a few feet. He gave Vincent a long, hard look. Vincent walked conspicuously with his coat behind his back, concealing his hands. The porter did not seem preoccupied with them as he passed, however. No one else gave them more than a passing glance. Cissnei left them at the port with a wave and a final caution: "don't draw attention to yourselves." Her assessment had been accurate. The Big Whale was a big, anonymous vessel. The crew was either new or too absorbed with its own activities to pay strangers much mind. AVALANCHE boarded and made its way to the crew quarters of deck one.

After about two hours of hovering at alert in what Cissnei had assured them was a normally-unused quarter, an alarm signaling their departure sounded. Yuffie lurched and notified them they were moving and then that was that. Aerith and Barret exchanged a sympathetic look. They had never gotten along, but then, they were both leaving someone important behind.

Cloud explored the top deck. Barret, Cid, and Vincent: the boiler room. Aerith followed Yuffie on a quick trip in search of the life boats in case of an emergency. Yuffie swayed and staggered with every minute turn of the ship. She tried hard not to show her disorientedness. When they made it to the outside of the boat, salty, windy air stinging their eyes and noses, Yuffie could take no more. After about half an hour of Yuffie keeled over the edge of the ship, Aerith announced her intention to return inside.

Aerith re-entered their quarters. Through a steel bulkhead, she heard water shut off. A moment later, Tifa emerged, a towel draped across her back, otherwise as naked as the day she was born. She froze when her eyes met Aerith. She cast her eyes down self-consciously. Aerith tried not to stare. Tifa had nothing she had never seen before, though she was alarmingly… bountiful.

Aerith tried not to gape at the hideous scar running at a diagonal from her collarbone to ribcage.

Tifa quarter-turned to towel off.

"I couldn't help it," Tifa said. "I haven't felt this grimy and nasty for years."

"I know the feeling," Aerith said.

"Yuffie's puking her guts out outside, isn't she?"

"How did you know?"

"She doesn't like to advertise her weaknesses, but for such a crazy driver, she gets really motion-sick if anyone else is driving for more than a few minutes."

"I'm not surprised. She was pretty quiet on the drive here."

Tifa dried her hair. "What are you going to do when we get to Wutai?"

Aerith sat on the edge of a bunk bed. "I haven't thought that far ahead. I don't have anything there. All I have is back in Midgar."

"I know," Tifa said. "I lost my life in Nibelheim. Now I've lost it in Midgar. You can stay with us."

"I'm not so sure Barret would like that."

Tifa shrugged. "Who cares?"

"Or Cloud."

"He's warming up to you."

"So what are you going to do in Wutai?" Aerith said.

"I haven't decided yet."

"Are you going to keep fighting Shinra with Yuffie and Barret? Maybe Cloud?"

Tifa hesitated. "No."

Aerith stood. "Why not?"

"I can't bear the thought of taking another human life unnecessarily."

"You know how dangerous this is, don't you, Tifa? Keeping Vincent alive and with us is putting all of us in danger."

Tifa stepped closer. "I don't see you stopping me."

Cloud entered and froze. Tifa was completely naked, almost nose-to-nose with Aerith. A half dozen indecent thoughts scrambled through his brain. Aerith could tell. She could see them.

Men.

Tifa covered herself, unhurried. "Give me a minute?"

Cloud stared at Tifa as well, though he was not looking at the scar. When she spoke, his head snapped up. "Right." He closed the door behind himself.

"I don't think we'll make it to Wutai," Tifa half-whispered.

Aerith frowned. "What makes you think that?"

"Getting on this ship was way too easy. Even though he tried to hide his face, no one gave Cloud a second glance."

"I think you're right."

Tifa began to dress. "Here's hoping we're both wrong."

* * *

Aerith heard Yuffie cry in her sleep for the first time that night. No one slept at all for over three hours, however. Barret and Cid talked in hushed voices. Yuffie read a cheap romance novel: the kind Aerith would have never thought she would like. Tifa and Cloud lay in their beds far across the room from each other and listened, sitting up at every unusually loud groan from the bowels of the ship.

Vincent did not talk. He did not sleep. He did not eat from Cissnei's stash of sea rations Tifa offered with reluctance. He just sat.

By three a.m., they agreed to stay up and watch him in shifts. He was bound to the edge of a vacant bunk bed. All of AVALANCHE seemed to know he was holding back; waiting for something that had yet to come. It was after Cid, the only other one left awake, exited to call a contact on his PHS, Vincent finally spoke.

"You're frightened of me, girl," Vincent said.

Aerith saw his eyes gleam in the pale light. She sat upright beside her bed. "I don't trust you. I don't even know what you are."

"Humans are afraid of that which they don't understand."

"No. It's not that I don't understand you. You tried to _shoot_ us."

He chuckled.

"And I'm not afraid of you," she said. "I said I don't trust you. You tried to kill us."

"Then answer me this," he said. "Why did you not let them kill me?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Wrong answer. You know perfectly well what I'm talking about. Your friend has lost the will to kill. You know full well a captive Turk gives you no bargaining power. Yet neither you nor she has disclosed that knowledge. It is as though you want to get your comrades killed."

Aerith surveyed the room. The rest of AVALANCHE still slept soundly. "You're complaining?"

Vincent's voice was strangely impassive. "You saved my life. Why?"

"Sometimes we humans do things without a good reason." She now took it for granted she was speaking to something other than a human.

"Humans always have a reason. Even if it's a stupid one."

Aerith looked away.

Neither spoke for five minutes.

"You won't answer me," Vincent said.

"I can't answer."

"Because you don't have a reason."

"I didn't want you to die."

"But I'm your enemy. I would kill you."

"Don't think I'm on the same level as you."

"That still doesn't answer my question. Why is my life so special to you?"

Aerith shrugged. "It's not. It's not any more special than any other. All life is special. All life is sacred. And that's the best answer you'll get."

Vincent laughed. "All life is sacred?"

"What's so funny?"

"You're a human. To live is to take life. From the plants and animals you eat to all of the lives lost to support your tiresome civilization. Your new best friend has taken more than her fair share of innocent life. How can you reconcile that with this naïve notion that 'all life is sacred?'"

"I can't. Okay? It's something I believe. For that, I don't have a reason."

Vincent quieted. "What would you say if I told you you're wrong? I know it for a fact. My life isn't sacred."

"I'd say, 'get over yourself.'"

Vincent remained still for all of a minute. Only the sound of Barret's snore disturbed the perfect silence. "Cid Highwind. I like that name."

Aerith looked up. "Huh?"

"Are you familiar, Aerith Gainsborough, with the Legend of the Four Crystals?"

"I can't say that I am."

Vincent 'hmphed.' "It's a very old story. They say it's one of the foundating myths of the human race itself. Countless versions have been told across the generations. They tell the tale of a far off world governed by the magical powers of the elements."

Aerith scowled.

"There is at least one curious commonality all versions of this story contain. They all feature minor characters by the name of 'Cid.'" Often, but not always, he is a scientist or engineer of some sort. He is sometimes instrumental in the making or running of primitive airships."

Aerith's heart jumped.

"If I were ever to make up a name…"

Aerith bolted to her feet. "Tifa! Cloud!"

* * *

"_Reno__, Elena, and Rude are in position. Are you sure about this?_"

"It needs to happen tonight."

"_They're suspicious? I thought you said they trusted you completely._"

"These aren't your garden variety terrorists. I don't even think we would have made it this far if they weren't running on two days without a good night's sleep. I think Cissnei raised a few red flags. Also, they expect a certain degree of challenge. We should have at least tightened security in the port. They would have expected that."

"_And risk another Sector Five incident? No. They needed to be isolated._"

"I understand, Tseng. Well, we're half-a day's sail from Junon. I think the time's right."

"_Fair enough. Well, stay on your toes. If all goes well, you'll be back home within a few days. You've done well, Reeve._"

"Sir." "Cid" hung up his PHS.

Home? What home? He had no home. He had not had a home since that night three years ago. That night, he worked late in Shinra Tower and he would have worked later if he had not heard the news on the radio. The train stations were all locked down. By the time he reached Sector Five, all that was left was a smoldering brick face and a garden that, after years and years of effort, never grew.

The only flowers in Sector Five grew in her cathedral garden. For that, he hated the flower girl from the moment he met her in Seventh Heaven.

All that time ago, Tseng warned him of the phenomenon of a spy empathizing with his enemy. He searched his heart and found no empathy—only hatred. He hated pandering to the killers' provincial world view. It was a world view that disregarded the complexities of civilization and condoned the dehumanization and murder of those with whom they disagreed. He hated pretending to be like them. Most of all, he hated _him_. He hated drinking and smoking with him. He hated pretending to be his friend for years.

The man AVALANCHE knew as "Cid" ran his fingers through bleached blond hair. After days without enough privacy to fuss over his disguise, black roots emerged. A patchy, mottled brown beard would appear within another several days. In the bathroom below deck an hour ago, he saw a face almost like his own of years before, but unnervingly different: more sallow and older than the three years difference should have accounted for.

His life in Urban Development those years ago more and more seemed like the life of another. When the Turks needed an infiltrator for a dangerous mission, he passed all of the aptitude tests. He volunteered readily. He had nothing to lose. In the mirror, he no longer saw a mid-level bureaucrat.

He saw everything he was meant to become.

Cid, no, Reeve froze. The cold metal of a knife rested at his throat. It was not especially sharp. He knew its owner well enough to know that was purposeful. She had no interest in quick, painless death. His breath misted in the chill of the night air. "Yuffie… what are you doing?" he said.

"I've got a lot of questions for you. Depending on whether or not I like the answer, you're dead," she whispered.

Barret's voice became audible. "Let him go, Yuffie."

"But…"

"I said, let him go. Let him explain himself."

Yuffie pushed away her captive. He slammed against the sheet metal of a wall. He leaned against the edge of the ship. The freighter pitched and yawed. Tifa, Cloud, Yuffie, Barret, and Aerith formed a half-circle around him. Vincent, bound in handcuffs covered by a marine jacket, hovered near Aerith.

"What's the meaning of this?" Reeve said.

"We're all just tired…" Barret said. "We're pissed off. It's late. Just tell us 'cause they really want to know. Who was that Cissnei woman? You said she's a sympathizer. How come I ain't ever heard of her before?"

Reeve noticed a flutter of movement above and behind AVALANCHE. "Because she's not. Ain't even her real name. She's a Turk operative."

Barret blinked. "What…?"

"She set all of you up. So did I."

"What are you sayin', Cid? I've known you for years. You gave us intel about Shinra Public Safety. You helped me fuckin' blow up reactor Number One!"

"None of that intel was worth shit, Barret. And remember all the Shinra troops we met up with at Reactor One? I led all of you into a trap. When you got yourselves out of it, I didn't have any choice but to go along with it."

"You watched Marlene while I was out on missions. You spent hours with me drinking into the night."

"You think I liked living in a shithole bar in the middle of the goddamn slums? I didn't like it for a fucking minute."

"Why? How can you do this?" Barret cried.

"I did for Shera and our unborn child," Reeve said. "Her name was on the news after Reactor Five. I'm sure you don't remember. You ruined my fuckin' life. You took everything that was ever important to me and it pisses me off you don't even know or care. When this is all over and done I hope they let me be the one to pull the level to gas all of you monsters."

Yuffie lowered her head and inhaled a sharp breath. She approached, flipping the knife in her hand, preparing to strike.

"Yuffie, don't," Barret said.

Yuffie hesitated. Barret's eyes met Reeve's. They struggled to connect. They struggled to understand.

Barret remained disconnected. His mechanical arm whirled and out emerged a gatling gun. He brought it to bear on Reeve.

Aerith looked over her shoulder, startled, as though tracking a sound. No sounds were made, but Reeve knew exactly where she was looking. "Barret," she cried out. "Don't…"

From the sound of it alone, it was no ordinary gunshot. The cacophonous boom echoed through metal of the ship's deck and the thick, misty night air.

Barret's right arm disappeared between the mechanical attachment and his elbow in a flash of crimson. He crumbled to the ground and whimpered over his shattered limb.

Yuffie's eyes flashed. Before she could move, Reeve raised a halting hand and spun it around. She turned in time to see the squad of Public Safety infantrymen emerge from around a corner. Rude and Elena stood at their front. Reno waved from a ledge above behind a high-caliber rifle: the kind they used to stop armored units.

Cloud reached for his sword.

"I wouldn't do that," Reeve said.

Cloud grasped the hilt. "I'm at least taking you with us."

Barret struggled to his knees. "Kill the fucker, Spike…"

Reeve gestured to stop with one hand. With the other, he reached for his PHS. "Not yet. Not until you hear this. Trust me."

Reeve dialed a number. As he did so, a loud, low hum echoed through the air.

An airship was coming.

The PHS rang as Reeve set it to speaker. It picked up. "_Lieutenant Antilles._"

Reeve smirked. "I want to talk to our guests, Lieutenant Antilles."

"_Sir..._"

Rumbling, rustling sounds came through the receiver.

"The hell are you tryin' to pull, Cid?" Barret said.

The soft, young voice on the PHS cut through the humid air and the low growl of the narrow airship high overhead. "_Daddy? Is that you?_"

Barret stood, clutching the stub of his arm. "Marlene?"

"_Daddy, I'm scared!_" she said.

An older female voice joined Marlene's. "_It's okay. Don't worry, dear._"

Aerith shook. "_Mom?_"

"_We're okay dear… Don't worry about us. You have to stay safe…_" Elmyra said.

A male voice spoke through the phone. "_Sorry boss,_" Biggs said. "_I guess in the end I wasn't good enough._"

"Biggs…" Barret said. "What happened?"

"_They were waiting for us at the safe house,_" Biggs said. "_I don't know how the Turks got in, but they knew exactly where we were and how to get to us…_"

Barret wiped away a tear, from pain or sorrow, no one could tell. "Corneo. It had to be that bastard Corneo!"

"You lower-plate scum need each other," Cid said. "You shouldn't be so eager to burn bridges."

The airship hovered overhead, its propellers changing the current of wind all around. From a rope ladder descended a strikingly handsome and exotic man in a sharp navy blue sut. He touched his feet to the ground and removed an earphone.

"Game, set, and match, Barret Wallace," the man with long black hair said.

"Tseng," Aerith said.

Reeve hung up his PHS and smirked.

Tseng approached within twenty meters of AVALANCHE. He studied their faces; surveyed Barret on the ground. He frowned at Vincent for a barely-perceptible second. "You probably could kill me, Cloud Strife, but not only would all of you be dead in seconds, I wouldn't count on your friends and family in Midgar living."

Cloud released the handle of his sword.

Aerith knelt by Barret. It was a gaping, bleeding wound that could not be easily healed. Her palms glowed. She jolted backwards as though shocked. Barret sobbed uncontrollably. Tears streaked down Aerith's face. "You bastard…"

"He won't have much longer," Tseng said. "We'll treat him for shock and control the bleeding once you've all surrendered."

Yuffie seethed. "You didn't mind gunning us down like dogs before…"

Tseng's eyes narrowed. "I thought we could be civilized about this. But… if you insist… Don't hit the Cetra girl, men." He raised his right hand. The faceless infantrymen raised their rifles.

"No! You have to promise not to hurt them," Aerith cried.

Tseng lowered his hand. "What was that?"

"Aerith, no," Tifa said.

"I'll come willingly if you promise not to hurt them," Aerith said.

Tseng's lip curling into a brief smile. Then his face returned blank, sphinx-like. "They'll get a fair trial. This time, you'll be treated with dignity. So will your friends. That's all I can promise."

Aerith glared hard at Tseng. He looked away from the force swelling up from within her eyes. It affected even Reeve. "I guess this is goodbye…"

Tifa wiped her eyes. "Aerith…"

"I'll try to help," Aerith said. "I'll find a way to help and I'll make sure Marlene and Biggs are okay." She extended her hands towards Tseng, prepared to be handcuffed.

Tseng tensed his lower lip. He watched Aerith with an unreadable expression. "That won't be necessary this time." He nodded to Cloud, Yuffie, Barret, and Tifa. "Elena. Rude…"

"Tseng?" Elena said.

Handcuff them. And take Vincent to the brigg with them."

Rude and Elena gasped. Vincent himself looked almost surprised, emoting as much as much as anyone had ever seen him emote at least, which was not much.

"What have I done?" Vincent said.

"You have to earn the right to be a Turk, Vincent," Tseng said. "We made you one way too soon."

"I haven't done anything wrong," Vincent said.

"Maybe not," Tseng said. "But you're an unknown quantity. I don't need unknown quantities in the equation now. The stakes are too high. Rude. Elena."

The two Turks approached with handcuffs.

Yuffie glowered. "You're dead. You know that, don't you Cid?"

The infantrymen froze and aimed their weapons.

"Not now," Yuffie said. "But you will be. Just wait."

Reeve smirked. "You're one to talk."

Tseng held onto Aerith, supporting her as they lifted up into the airship high overhead. Over the thundering of its propellers, Yuffie objected as the Turks handcuffed her. Many emotions crossed Reeve's heart until he finally settled on one:

Elation.

* * *

Tseng led Aerith with surprising gentleness to her isolated cell. Metal bars locked her out of a long corridor. Through a narrow window, she could barely make out the blinking lights of the superfreighter below. She had no reason to trust the man at her side. Still, she was calm and at peace. He was an old, familiar soul. Somehow she just knew.

"I apologize for how General Heideggar's men and even my own treated you during your last detention."

"Do you expect small gestures of kindness will lead me to cooperate or betray my friends?"

"No. I'll be kind to you because it's the right thing to do."

Aerith tried to respond, but the words caught in her throat.

Tseng looked away. "I can't guarantee what President Shinra will say or do. But I'll try my best."

"What's going to happen to them?"

"Your friends?"

Aerith nodded.

"With the charges against them and the strength of the evidence, I wouldn't expect them to live, or at least ever see the light of day again," Tseng said.

Aerith leaned against her cell wall.

"Tell me. Only because I'm curious," Tseng said. "Why would an upstanding young girl: the daughter of a pensioned widow who raises and sells flowers run off with a band of terrorists?"

"Your problem is that you see them as nothing but terrorists. I would never condone some of the things they've done. But even you know they have good reason for doing what they do," Aerith said.

"There are very few good excuses for wanton destruction like that."

"There are also very few good excuses for living your life knowing you're doing something terribly wrong day-in and day-out."

He broke away from their eye-to-eye link, afraid. "Your mother will be released once we return to Midgar; after meeting the president. What happens to to you after that is up to the president."

"The president's not in Midgar?" Aerith said.

"He's waiting for us at the Cosmo Canyon research facility. I'm sure he'll be eager to speak with you. Your friends too, but for different reasons."

"What's in Cosmo Canyon?"

"Some things we need to show you, Aerith. Maybe you'll give us the chance to explain ourselves better. And maybe you can explain a few things to us in turn."

And then he was gone, disappeared down the long corridor. Aerith thought she heard Yuffie's protests a deck below. The airship moved. She had never before been in an airship. At this altitude, the voices of the planet took on a new pitch. Frequencies that seemed in dischord from the ground seemed to harmonize and melodize in tandem from so far away. The airship pulled away from the freighter while curious sailors watched from below.

The voices cried. They sang.

A black figure floated across the horizon. He hovered at a stable distance from the airship. He was too far away from Aerith to see his mako green eyes.

The voices rejoiced.


	11. Chapter 11: The Calamity from the Sky

**11**

**The Calamity from the Sky**

"How's your hand, sir?"

Rufus Shinra glanced at his bandaged hand. Surgery and rehabilitation had partly restored its functionality. It would never "heal." That much was obvious. In any case, Rufus was not in the mood for small talk. "Fine. Tell me more about him, Tseng."

The long corridor transitioned into a tangled mess of wires and metal: a steel superstructure lining a cave wall. The Cetra and a race of sentient felines once coexisted harmoniously here. Now both races lay extinct; their tombs boarded over by human civilization.

At the end of the corridor, Tseng swiped his card key and entered the passcode. No other prisoner in all of Gaia was held under such tight security. "I don't know more than what's on record myself. He didn't interact with others much. Though your father promoted him to head of the Science Research Division a few years before the Nibelheim incident, he spent most of his time away from Midgar."

"Unfortunate," Rufus said. "Why did he get that job if he was so distant?"

"Because no one in the world understands mako like he does. He studied it constantly for years: its uses as fuel; its effects on the human body. He created models to quantify its rate of depletion as power and the impact of mako reactors on the ecosystem. It was his obsession."

"When questioned, he didn't deny any of it? He meant to unleash Jenova?"

"That's what the records say."

Rufus passed a sliding door. It closed behind him as another in front opened. The fresh outside air was sucked away, replaced by stale, calcified air from deeper in the tunnel. "Is it true what he did to his body?"

Tseng almost blanched. "It is."

"Does anyone know who it is…?"

"Unfortunately no…"

"What kind of crazy…?"

"He's crazy, but he's smart. Too damn smart."

They passed rows of cells, but they were empty. All of them.

"Is all this security necessary, Tseng?" Rufus said.

"He almost got away once before. Right after Nibelheim. We don't know how, but we haven't had any problems since he's been here."

He sat facing them. Chains stretched his arms out across the wall. His head dangled low; veiled by long, graying black hair. He wore a tattered blue shirt: once several shades lighter.

Rufus studied him. He looked like a man—just a man like any other. Looks could be deceiving. Rufus knew that better than most. "I finally get to meet the man who issued the human race a death sentence."

The prisoner chortled in a high, crackling voice.

* * *

A man in navy blue brushed past a male medic in the brightly-lit infirmiry, aware of his presence, but disregarding it nonetheless. The medic turned and postured, prepared to fight or speak. Then he recognized the spiked red hair of the Turk. He walked away as quickly as possible.

"What do you mean we can't take him in?" Reno said.

The woman with long strawberry blonde hair and one blue eye sighed. "You heard me, Reno. Cosmo Canyon doesn't have any decent medical facilities. He'll have to be medivaced back to Midgar."

"Come on. It was just a flesh wound, Shalua."

Dr. Rui pointed to Barret Wallace, unconscious on the operating table. "Reno, you blew his arm off at the elbow with a high-powered rifle. You can't just expect him to be all honkey-dorey."

"Honkey-dorey?" Reno leered. "I haven't ever heard you use language like that, Doc. Sounds kinda kinky."

"Slimeball…"

"Well look…. He didn't have much of a right arm anyway."

"He's in shock. We can keep him stabilized on the Highwind for a while, but absolutely not. I refuse to allow him in a prison. It could kill him."

"The President really wants to talk to him," Reno said.

"That could kill him too."

"He's not going to like this…"

"Well Shinra hired me to be a doctor, not a cronie. That's _your_ job."

Reno opened his mouth to speak when his PHS rang. "What?"

"_Reno__?_" It was Tseng.

"Lockhart, Kisaragi, Strife, and Vincent got transferred to Bloc 5," Reno said. "She won't let me take Wallace and he's the ringleader."

"_Forget about it. President Shinra told me he can wait. We'll have plenty of time back in Midgar. It's the Cetra he really wants to speak to. Her and then Strife._"

"She's still in solitary upstairs…"

"_Bring her to the observation deck in ten minutes. We'll meet you there._"

Reno was silent.

"_What's wrong, Reno?_"

It just did not sit right with him. "Did we really need to take Vincent away like that?"

"_You're worried about Vincent all of a sudden?_"

"I mean… it's not like I _like_ him all of a sudden. He's weird and he's a serious douche. But he was kinda one of us."

"_Do you trust him, Reno?_"

"Well… no."

"_I trust all of you with my life._"

"Tseng…"

"_I could have explained myself better. But that's a talk for another time. For now, I need you to get Aerith and bring her to the observatory._"

"Right…" Reno hung up the phone. He glowered at the doctor. She looked far more smug than she should have looked. "You're lucky this time." Reno walked away before she could respond. They both liked getting in the last word. He would deny her. He opened the door and was met by darkness.

"That's the utility closet, Reno," she said. "The door's that way."

Reno left as quickly as possible, trying hard to ignore Shalua Rui's laughter.

Porters and infantrymen waded through the docked airship. Through scattered portholes, he caught glimpses of red-tan rock and eerily cloudless skies. He ascended the Highwinds clinking metal stairs and walked down the long corridor to Aerith's solitary cell.

She sat on the edge of her bunk and stared out her porthole window. She tilted her head at his approach, still looking away.

"Reno, isn't it?" she said.

He had not spoken yet and she had not seen him.

_Weird_.

"The president wants to see you," he said.

"Are you going to be there this time?"

It stung. "No. None of that. Just you and him, and Tseng. Maybe that weirdo Bugenhagen."

Aerith turned. Such a lovely face. Such lovely eyes. She nodded once and stood.

"After you," he said. She led the way out.

They walked in silence. When they reached the lower deck, a few passers-by turned and whispered. Then they descended the ramp to the landing pad.

"Look, Aer… Miss Gainsborough," Reno said. "I'm sorry. It ain't something I wanted to do. I was only…"

She froze. She scanned the canyon and its ancient cliff dwellings, mostly intact despite the size of the Shinra base. "Where is this?" Aerith whispered.

"Cosmo Canyon," Reno said. "It's one of our biggest research facilities."

"Research?"

"It's been a settlement as far back as anyone can remember. It's one of the last known Ancient ruins."

Aerith turned.

"That's what the travel brochure said," Reno said.

The canyon echoed with the cry of a raptor. The engine of an ascending airship washed away the sound.

"Show me where to go," Aerith said.

* * *

The vast canyon echoed with a song so loud and deep she sometimes heard it from half-way across the world. The walls amplified the melody linked through every empty, decayed cave dwelling. Nothing gaudy or shiny or modern Shinra built could dampen its timbre. It persisted despite the Shinra base and its nearby mako reactor. It was the only place she had ever encountered that seemed unaffected by them. It was a place that made Shinra seem small.

It was like coming home. Maybe to her ancestors this _had_ been home. For Aerith, it was a powerful moment.

Then he ruined it with his presence. At the top of the observatory, past creaking wooden stairs and a tall wooden doorway sat a round room, the base of a telescope at its center. The lights were dimmed, but she could see his strawberry blond hair from across the room. He sat beside the Turk, Tseng.

"Leave us, Reno," Tseng said.

Reno walked off with the wave of his hand. The door closed behind her. As much as she tried to steel herself, Aerith still recoiled when Rufus Shinra stood and walked towards her. His chilly eyes locked onto her.

"Elmyra Gainsborough is scheduled to be released today," Rufus said. "Marlene Wallace will also be released into her custody."

Aerith froze. She wanted to be relieved, but relief would not come yet. "And Biggs?"

"He'll remain in our custody and stand trial. Thankfully for him, he seems not to have been involved in any of AVALANCHE's major attacks."

"I want to talk to my mother," Aerith said.

"She's in transit from Shinra custody," Rufus said. "That would not be prudent at this time."

"I'm not sure I have much of a reason to believe you. You abducted me from my home and held my mother hostage."

"You think I'm lying then?" he said.

No, he was not lying. Not _exactly_. That much, Aerith could tell. "I suppose you expect me to thank you?"

"No. We no longer have a use for them. I'm just putting all of my cards on the table. I don't keep secrets from my allies. That's what I hope you'll be."

Aerith frowned.

He looked away for a fraction of a second. "When we met last… I had just found out my father was dead at General Sephiroth's hands. I appologize for the way you were treated. I was hasty. Besides… I was not acting under the best counsel…" He glared at Tseng, who looked away.

_Liar_. He chose the wrong partner for good-cop/bad-cop. Tseng looked ashamed, but there was no shame in his heart—only self-consciousness. She caught him looking at her and watched her carefully.

Tseng imagined her changing clothes. He imagined it _loudly_. Just the same, he neither liked nor wanted to imagine it.

Just the same, Aerith flinched.

Rufus' eyes narrowed. He too stared at her.

The truth dawned on Aerith. They knew about her telepathy and were testing its limits.

"My father hoped to rule the planet through fear. I believe only in the power of money." Rufus gave her a meaningful stare. Another test?

Aerith scowled. "I hope you have a point and didn't bring me here just to play games."

Tseng and Rufus gave each other a look.

"General Sephiroth wishes to kill you." Rufus said. "Your friend 'Cid' told us that much. Sephiroth wants to destroy all human life itself. We need you and I think you need us."

"Why though?" Aerith said. "Why does he want to destroy the world?"

"Because that's what Jenova is telling him to do." He registered a wavering; a flinching within her. "You know about Jenova, don't you? It's the lifeform Sephiroth, Cloud Strife, and your boyfriend Zack Fair found in Nibelheim. But how much do you _really_ know?"

Aerith stood amidst enemies. She knew they would tell her the truth only in so far as it quited their purpose. She knew she was being manipulated. She even knew he meant to manipulate her with the mention of _his_ name.

It was working and there was nothing she could do about it.

"Tell me what you know…" Aerith said.

"… If you tell me what you know," Rufus said.

Aerith swallowed. "Deal."

Rufus smiled a little. "Bugenhagen!"

A small blue form emerged through a side door, bearded and seated on a hovering pod, he approached. He was old and tired: an ancient man of some importance long, long ago, Aerith could tell. His stare disconcerted her. He gaffawed and watched her with narrowed eyes as he circled her. "So you're Aerith! Quite a fetching young thing you've become!"

"I'm sorry," Aerith said. "Do I know you from somewhere?"

"No, but I've seen you many, many times," Bugenhagen said.

"Get the first video, Bugenhagen" Rufus told the old man.

He gaffawed again, an odd dysrythmic thing, and floated across the room to fiddle with several monitors. Though once he had been a man of some importance, he was now quite mad.

"Sit please," Rufus said, gesturing towards an antique chair near Aerith.

Aerith turned to Rufus. "Videos?"

"This is the first of several videos found in the possession of Professor Hojo, the architect of the Nibelheim excavation. This will explain a lot. Perhaps you can help me fill in the blanks afterwards."

A monitor flicked on, its image scrambled. Bugenhagen jostled it and the image cleared.

Archaic instrument panels lined the room of dark cedar. It was a room devoid of all warmth and femininity if not for a blue and tan rug. She sat behind the desk staring at the adjusting camera.

Aerith leaned in. She saw her own eyes reflected in the monitor, only the eyes belonged to the face framed by exotic chestnut hair before her.

"_Could you tell me your name?" a warm male voice said._

_ "Ifalna," she said in a voice so much like Aerith's own._

_ "Where are you from, Ifalna?"  
"I was born in what you call the Forgotten Capitol."_

_ "How long ago?"_

_ She smiled. "Two-hundred and fourteen years ago."_

_ "Is it true you are the last Ancient?"_

_ "You humans always called us that. We are the Cetra. No, I'm not the last. I don't think I am. I hope I'm not. Even if I'm not, we're all but extinct."_

_ "Tell me a little bit about the Cetra."_

_ "For countless generations, we have lived off the land. For the past few centuries, we've struggled to survive. We've always had a deep connection with the planet, Gaia, as we're its original inhabitants."_

_ "What of humans, Ifalna?"_

_ "Millenia ago, a civilization long-since forgotten by your people arrived on ships that sailed across the stars. You came from a world you called Spi'ra, having exhausted its resources with a precursor to today's mako power. Needing a new home, your ancestors invaded ours. Your race waged a war that nearly wiped out our kind and your own. My ancestors came to call you, 'The Calamity from the Sky.'"_

_ "Hm. Tell me a little more about your physiology."_

_ "Well… I guess it goes without saying that even though we age differntly and have some differencecs in latent mental powers, we're not all that…"_

_ A childish voice called from behind the camera. "Mommy, I chopped the onions!"_

_ Ifalna's eyes widened. She leapt from her seat. "By the Goddess, Aerith, put that knife down!"_

_ The camera spun and fell to the side. A small girl of two or three stood sideways at the doorway._

The screen went black. Aerith settled back in her chair. Her heart decelerated little by little.

Rufus Shinra and Tseng stared at her.

"What does this mean?" Aerith said.

"We're getting there. Just give us a little longer."

Bugenhagen started the second of twenty-eight videos.

* * *

The leaky pipe far away along the dark mason corridor dripped and dripped. Tifa had somehow managed to avoid prisons for much of her life, but she suspected that was not this building's original function. She had no clock, but she guessed many hours had passed and no one had fed them lunch or dinner by the growl of her stomach. Yuffie tried to hail the guard and beg, taunt, or plead with every pass. Cloud was nearby, but he was quiet. What else was new? They had not had much to talk about for a long time anyway.

Tifa noticed an unusually long period of time had passed since last seeing the Shinra guard patrolling the corridor. Small, dull footsteps approached, clinking and clanking at an unusual pitch. A tall shadow emerged from the pale yellow glow from the guard station around the corner. As its source approached, the shadow shrank smaller and smaller. Its inhuman features appeared.

The small crowned black and white cat pranced into view.

Tifa jumped up. "Cait?"

The cat looked about as smug as a mechanical cat had ever looked. "Sorry I'm late."

Cloud spoke. Finally. "It took you long enough."

The cat looked suddenly deflated.

"Where have you been?" Yuffie said.

The cat waved a ring of keys and began unlocking the cell doors. "I had a spare Cait, but immediately after the Sector Five ambush, they locked out everyone with my security clearance. Cait Sith's interface program was hidden, encrypted on Shinra's intranet. I don't think they found it or found out what it was for, but I figured I should try to recreate it outside of Shinra and wipe the original. I came as soon as I could." He unlocked Tifa.

"Are we safe now?" Tifa said.

"I have control over all the security for this bloc. Cameras; alarms. Everything. There's another cell bloc underground I can't access though. The firewall's tighter than anything I've ever seen."  
"Barret?" Cloud said.

Cait Sith shook is head. "He's not here. I figured out from some comm. chatter that he's being taken back to Midgar. He was too badly wounded on the Big Whale."

Cloud and Tifa glanced at each other. Yuffie stayed quiet. It was a pointed kind of quiet. She was not usually good at concealing her true feelings, but she could when the situation demanded it.

"Thanks," Tifa said. "If you were really here, I'd give you the tightest hug..."

"Not a chance," Cloud said too abruptly. "The only reason he's still here is because Shinra doesn't know who he really is."

The cat scratched its head, surely not because of an itch.

They began walking down the long corridor towards the freight elevator that brought them down in the first place. They stepped over the patrol guard: now unconscious. In a cell to their right, Tifasaw a slender, dark figure crouched against brick and steel.

Crimson eyes looked up from a pale face.

Tifa's eyes lingered on Vincent Valentine for a moment. Then she turned and left with the rest of AVALANCHE, wordless. He waited until he was alone with AVALANCHE gone and the guard station unattended.

No one saw Vincent Valentine melt into the shadows and disappear.

* * *

In the dark, windowless observatory, time passed quickly and would have been unknown if not for the lunch of soup and sandwiches. Aerith had never partaken in high tea before, but Rufus Shinra insisted they take a break from watching Dr. Gast's documentation of Ifalna for about fifteen awkward minutes—enough time to sip two cups of tea at his leisure and eat a handful of small, sweet biscuits. The ritual annoyed Tseng. She would have known that even without her powers of telepathy. She now knew her telepathy and connection to the planet were common traits amongst the Cetra. Those powers also confirmed that Bugenhagen's mental state had deteriorated during the Wutai Uprising. He also obsessed over calico cats. _That_ was a random insight.

"_Tell me a little bit about the war between the Cetra and the human race eons ago," Dr. Gast, no, her father said._

_ Ifalna leaned back against her chair. "As I said before, the human race is not indigenous to our world. When they exhausted the resources of their home, their scientists located Gaia as it had a similar climate and atmosphere to their home world. They set a massive ark ship containing the last of their kind. They had just enough fuel to arrive here. They had no intention of leaving this world once they arrived._

_ "We tried to coexist for a period. And no matter how much we tried to accommodate them with land and resources, it was clear they wanted more and more and could never be satisfied. War was inevitable._

_ "The human race was far superior to the Cetra technologically. In fact, from the stories they tell, their technology was even more advanced then than it is now. They had weapons capable of destroying entire cities as we found out. But we possessed the power to harness materia: pockets of energy from the Lifestream and use their power. We fought them with the full power of the plants and beasts of the world and our ability to channel the powers of the planet—our blue magic."_

_ "So what happened?" Gast asked._

_ "Eventually we lost. You unleashed a biological weapon that wiped out nearly all of our kind. Over the course of several years, our numbers were decimated. Finally only a few remained. We're very long-lived, but have a low fertility rate. Our population just couldn't keep up. And so, our high sorceress concluded if we were to die, then we had to at least save the planet from the invaders who seemed so intent on raping it and leaving it barren._

_ "They created Omega Weapon and the Jenova Project. The Great Sorceress wrought Omega of terra corrupt. A canon of pure mako charged with the destruction and hate of a million dead Cetra. To this day it rests silently to the far south—an archaological curiosity. Deep inside of it lie the controls to Omega Weapon. And no human will ever find it or deter it. You call it the Temple of the Ancients not knowing its true purpose."_

_ "And what is that purpose?" Gast asked._

_ "To purge the planet and beckon forth an ultimate fate. It was a weapon of last resort. The final end to all enemies of the planet."_

_ "Are humans the enemies of the planet?" Gast asked._

_ Ifalna paused at this. Aerith saw in her for a moment a woman whose heart contradicted itself. "It depends on who you ask."_

_ "So tell me about this Jenova."_

_ "Jenova was a biological weapon of a different sort. It was engineered through a combination of our magic and the biotechnology of the humans. According to legend, it happened near present-day Mount Nibel. It was created for the important task of interfacing with Omega Weapon. Only a Cetra, or at least a being infused with the power of the Lifestream can activate Omega Weapon. Jenova was created as a proxy for an actual Cetra. We were losing the war."_

_ "What ever happened to Jenova?" Gast asked._

_ Ifalna hesitated. "She's still there. Possibly still in Mount Nibel."_

_ "Could a living being have survived so many thousands of years?"_

_ "She's not a living organism as we know it. She has a host body, you see, and that host body was placed in suspended animation long ago and, presumably, never awakened. The host body was created only as a temporary vessel. Jenova herself is capable of transferring via the Lifestream to the consciousness of other living beings. She can override some processes of the host's consciousness and even alter it on the fundamental biological level."_

_ "Like a computer virus," Gast said._

_ "I suppose you could liken it to that…" Ifalna said._

_ "Could Jenova be awakened today?"_

_ "It would have to be done by a Cetra like myself, or at least a human capable of resonating with it."_

_ "How do you know about all of this?"_

_ "Because my great, great great grandmother was given the keys to operate Omega Weapon."_

Bugenhagen turned off the monitor.

"That's it," Rufus said. "That's the last of the files in Professor Hojo's possession."

"I don't understand what any of this means," Aerith said.

"What it means," Rufus said, "Is we're alien invaders. We killed this world's natives and it looks like the planet's out for revenge."

"And that 'revenge' is being carried out by General Sephiroth? What happened to him in Nibelheim?" Aerith said.

"The former President Shinra sent a small military detachment to investigate what looked like an old Cetra military base. Purely academic. But Professor Hojo requested that SOLDIER be sent. I gather from reports he said it had something to do with the way the Cetra integrated mako power and magic into their weapons. He convinced the former president and General Heideggar there might be military applications to the discovery."

"And your father just went along with it?"

Rufus shrugged. "I can't explain it if I tried. I gather you heard what happened next from Tifa Lockhart or Cloud Strife."

"She wasn't clear on all the details," Aerith said.

"The mako infusion our SOLDIERs undergo caused Jenova to react as though she had made contact with a Cetra. She awakened and seeing humans, she woke up fighting. From what I can tell from reports, when her host body was destroyed, her conscience transferred to General Sephiroth. And the rest, as they say, is history."

"And by the rest, you mean Shinra leveling an entire village to kill one man?"

"I'm not going to apologize for the actions of another. I'm not my father, Ms. Gainsborough."

_But you would have done the exact same thing,_ Aerith thought. "What happened to my mother and father?"

"They were killed by a strange creature about a week after that last recording you viewed. You were found in nearby Modeoheim and ended up in foster care in Midgar. You weren't hard to track down when we recovered these from Hojo's office in Nibelheim two years ago."

"Where's this Hojo now?"

"Someplace secret and safe where he won't hurt anyone. Maybe someday he'll even tell us everything he knows."

"Gracious hosts that you are," Aerith said.

Rufus frowned. That seemed to get him, if a little. "Perhaps now you can see why we were justified in suspecting you knew something about Jenova?"

Aerith crossed her legs and folded her arms.

"We had a deal," Rufus said. "I've shown you our full hand. Now you tell us what you know."

"I'm sorry," Aerith said. "I truly am. But I didn't know any of this. I have no memory of my life before coming to Midgar. It's all news to me."

Rufus and Tseng glanced at each other. They were exercising remarkable patience.

"Does anything ring a bell?" Tseng said. "Does anything click? I know from our undercover operative you've encountered General Sephiroth and that he seemed especially drawn to you. Did you talk? Did he say anything to you?"

Aerith looked away.

"I didn't invite you up here for my own health. The planet's survival is at stake," Rufus said.

Aerith's thoughts bubbled with resentment and anger. She had just seen her birth parents for the first time she could remember in her entire life. It should have been a private, happy moment—not one shared with two men she did not like staring at her; obsessing over every change in her face; any sign of emotional reaction.

As much as she disliked the situation, a part of her recognized its importance. She remembered her encounter with Sephiroth in Kalm. He wanted a "Black Materia" and seemed convinced she knew something about it. He seemed desperate for it. She did not have a black materia, but…

Aerith's eyes widened and dropped to her bustline. She did it all without conscious thought.

Rufus and Tseng exchanged a look again. "What?" Rufus said.

Aerith withdrew the necklace with the pearly white stone from around her neck.

Rufus looked hard at it, questioning its significance. "At the time I took it for one of those baubles made from inert materia you see everywhere on the streets…"

"It's not inert," Aerith said. "I can feel it. I've just… never known what it does. He wanted… He wanted a 'Black Materia.' I didn't know what he was talking about, but he seemed very interested in this. He tried to take it from me."

Tseng paced. "If he's looking for an activation 'key' for Omega Weapon, then maybe that's what this 'Black Materia' is. He didn't find it…"

"But he may have found the de-activation key," Rufus said.

Tseng and Rufus communicated without a word.

Aerith clutched the White Materia. They were about to take it from her.

Neither got the chance. Tseng's PHS rang. He checked the number and answered. "Major Darklighter? … I understand. Please buy us some time." He hung up.

Aerith felt an eerie resonance throughout the canyon teeming with the power of the Lifestream. "He's coming, isn't he? Sephiroth."

Tseng straightened his navy blue blazer and stood. "We have to go. You're not safe, Mr. President."

Aerith followed Rufus Shinra and Tseng out the door. Bugenhagen let out one last guffaw. They left him, but then, he made no attempt to follow.

"Sephiroth has no interest in me," Rufus said. Then he looked at Aerith. "He followed you here, didn't he?"

Aerith sped up to match their gait. "Probably."

Tseng grumbled a curse under his breath and picked up his PHS. "Reno, you and Rude start up the Tiny Bronco. Have Elena meet us in front of the observatory. We need to get out of…"

A deep rumble reverberated through the wooden hallway. The ground shook. The lights flickered.

"We need to get out of here." Tseng ended the call and placed another one. "Major Darklighter?" The PHS rang until the call went to voice mail.

They approached the door to the canyon. Tseng urged Rufus and Aerith to back against the opposite wall. He tipped the door open. A strange, sulfurous odor reached their noses: fuel metal, wood and other unknown materialsburningtogether. A tank exploded two-hundred meters away. Scattered gunfire aimed at a point of light in the sky. Flashes of light from above shot to the ground, silencing them.

"Tseng!" Elena jumped from behind a barrel on the other side of the door and rushed in.

Aerith looked up. She could barely see Sephiroth, the point of light in the sky, but she felt a strange, sinking feeling. "I think he saw you," Aerith said to Elena who watched her with wide, startled eyes.

Tseng rubbed his forehead and closed the door. "The Tiny Bronco's President Shinra's personal skiff. It's probably fast enough to outrun him, but it's on runway three. That's at least a half-kilometer's dash across open terrain."

"The elevator," Rufus said. "We descend to level B9 and head back up on the other side of the promenade."

"Sir," Tseng said, "if we're compromised then the prisoner might…?"

Another explosion jostled them.

"This way," Tseng said and they rushed down the hall.

* * *

The Shinra guard uniforms did not fit particularly well. They might fool a security camera, but the AVALANCHE escapees could only hope no other Shinra guards spotted them. Yuffie was too short to be a Public Safety infantryman. Cait Sith was bulging from his hiding place. The outpost became less and less cave-like as they ascended the emergency stairs. Cool limestone and occasional stalagtites became metal paneling and concrete. It was not like the wall of most buildings. It was armored.

"What's this base for anyway, Cloud?" Tifa asked.

"It's a scientific research facility," Cloud said. "I don't know a lot of the details."

Cait Sith poked his head out from under Tifa's coat. Cloud had not liked that hiding place at all. "It's an unusually concentrated source of mako power here and it's overall not very well-suited for settlement. I don't know a lot about it either, but I know the research facility to the northwest runs a lot of experiments on reactor technology. They say the SOLDIER program may have been developed here too. Professor Hojo worked out of this place for a while way before Nibeheim."

Cloud was not to be outdone. "There's a pretty big garrison here. Whatever they're protecting it's important."

Tifa ran up the steps in silence for a minute or two. They were only on level B7 and there seemed to be a lot of distance between floors. "What about this building we're in right now?"

"It's a prison, obviously," Yuffie said.

"A high security prison on the grounds of a scientific research facility?" Tifa said.

Cloud and the mechanical cat exchanged puzzled looks.

The ceiling rumbled. Crumbled bits of concrete sprinkled down from above. They all froze.

"What was that?" Yuffie said.

"Oh no," Tifa said. "Don't tell me…"

Cait Sith's head quirked to a side in a puzzling, twitchy way it often did when its operator was sifting through information. "It's him. Sephiroth's attacking!"

They began to sprint.

* * *

The freight elevator was slow. It seemed like the longest elevator ride of Aerith's life. Rufus and Tseng tried to maintain calm appearances. Elena was on the verge of panic. She was new. That would have been obvious even without Aerith'stelepathicpowers. Aerith herself did the best she could to block out the frenzied ebb and flow of the Lifestream. It was as tumultuous as it had been in Kalm; not a day before warming and comforting—now frightful.

Tseng looked at Aerith with what, if she didn't know any better, seemed almost like concern. "What's wrong?"

Aerith leaned against the wall, her head aching. "They're dying. Up above on the surface. So many of them."

Rufus and Tseng exchanged another one of their communicative looks. He pulled a mechanism out of his pocket. It looked almost like a PHS, but was not. He could have never gotten service this far underground.

"Scarlet," Rufus said into the mouthpiece of the machine. "Can Sister Ray get a lock on General Sephiroth over Cosmo Canyon? I know… the range… What's the ETA for the gunships?" Rufus looked at Tseng. "They're at least half an hour out." He inhaled. "I'm about to transmit the confirmation sequence. I want you to begin code ZH103."

Tseng paled. "The Hammer will destroy everything on the surface and everyone."

"You heard her." Rufus nodded to Aerith. "They'll be dead anyway." He pressed a few buttons on the device and spoke with the operator on the other line for another minute. He put away the device. "It'll take about ten minutes to aim. Hopefully that'll give us enough time. Notify Reno and Rude to take the Tiny Bronco up in about five minutes. They'll fly around and return for us after it's cleared."

Tseng stared for a moment, but then complied. If nothing else, he was a good soldier.

Aerith looked back and forth between them. "What's going on?"

"They're going to destroy everything on the surface and hopefully take out General Sephiroth with it," Elena said. She stopped when Tseng shot her a glare.

"What?" Aerith said. "All of those people…"

"They're making a sacrifice, but don't forget, if you and I die here, so dies the planet," Rufus said.

Aerith fumed. "Mr. President… no one in the world is as important as you think yourself."

Rufus cupped Aerith's face. "Have you always been this cheeky?"

Aerith brushed away his hand.

Another loud explosion rocked the base.

Rufus' device vibrated and he answered. "What?" He looked at Tseng. "Scarlet says they've lost visual on Sephiroth."

A terrible creak and rumble approached.

Tseng drew his gun. "Shit."

The elevator rumbled and everyone inside tumbled to the floor. They were no longer descending. They were going straight up, but not on the elevator's tracks. Aerith felt the frenetic sparkle of his energy not two meters away through the elevator roof. Their ascent felt even slower than their descent. Aerith shouted that he was above them. Elena started to aim her gun, but Tseng stopped her. It would either irritate him or hurt him and if it hurt him, he could drop them all.

Aerith knew they were on the surface and then she felt the elevator heave and drop several feet. They all stumbled to the bent floor. I long sword pieced between the twin doors of the elevator, prying them open with strength belonging to something other than a human. He emerged into the elevator, his silhouette backlit by irridescent flames of red, blue, and green.

Elena was first to her feet. She drew her pistol and fired a shot that went wild. She never had a chance to fire a second time.

Aerith covered her eyes a moment too late and would never clearly remember what exactly happened in that moment. She would only remember a splatter of crimson painting Rufus and Tseng and a startled cry in her consciousness as Elena left for wherever souls went.

Tseng looked startled for the first time since they met. He drew his own gun and fired blindly. Sephiroth lifted him by the thick of his neck and held him for a painfully long moment. His eyes narrowed and he threw Tseng aside like a ragdoll.

There was no one between Sephiroth and Aerith now. Rufus was gone—dragging Tseng towards the path of an approaching truck.

Aerith felt him clutch her neck and pitch her onto hard, broken pavement, the twilight illuminated as bright as day by mako flames. One of the Turks, Rude, drove the truck towards her. Sephiroth turned at their presence. He swung his sword and a flash of light lanced from its tip, slicing the front wheels and axels and the pavement below. He noticed Rufus Shinra running away under cover from the Turks. He smirked and turned away.

Aerith wiped her eyes and looked up at him. As much as Rufus had talked about her importance, she knew the president of Shinra regarded her as a lesser being, important, but not unexpendible. In his personal world, he was to be the planet's savior. No one else would or even could rob him of that title.

Sephiroth spoke in a low, sultry voice. "I do not need you alive, girl. I only want what is yours."

Then he turned with a start. Something snarled behind Aerith. She had not noticed its presence—its swirling, flickering aura—intelligent, angry, and familiar. Its mottled fur was a dusky purple. Across a broad, muscular back ran a blood-red mane. Its long snout bore rows of long teeth. Its horns pointed towards Sephiroth and it prepared to charge.

"You…?" Sephiroth began. Then he was impaled on its horns as the beast charged. It wailed in triumph and flung him twenty feet. Aerith fought a sickening feeling. No normal human could have survived that. Between the aftermath of the mauling and what was left of Elena, Aerith had never seen so much blood in her life.

Sephiroth stood, clutching his side. He seemed to be bleeding by the liter. "Impossible. You…"

The beast reared back. Its serpentine tail flickered. A ball of light materialized in its right hand and it pitched it at Sephiroth. Sephiroth crossed his arms across his body. A sphere of blue-green materialized around him, dispersing the ball of light. A second ball connected with the sphere.

The beast charged. Jagged claws penetrated the barrier and scattered it like torn paper. Its powerful jaws sought Sephiroth's throat. Drooling, breathing, they closed, but a sword penetrated the beast's chest. It froze and convulsed. The figure extruded black smoke and shifted; melted back to a human form—a human form clad in the navy blue dress suit of a Turk.

Pierced through the center, Vincent Valentine smirked and then melted. In his place hovered an amorphous pool of blue-black. It swirled and danced and then lunged at, no, _into_ Aerith.

She tried to scream, but she had no voice. It enshrouded her and swept her off her feet—quite literally. She could see, but barely. She took flight, caught within Vincent. Sephiroth watched from below, taking flight to follow, but unable to keep pace. And then he disappeared as they escaped farther and farther, higher and higher.

* * *

The door out was covered with debris and AVALANCHE emerged into chaos. Pale lights from burning fuel and mako flickered, illuminating the runways, broken buildings, and still cave walls. There was nothing alive amidst the wreckage. The haze of smoke, debris, and fresh death burned through Tifa's nose, burrowingintothe heart of her nervous system. She wobbled and stumbled to the ground. Something about this catastrophe struck especially hard. Nibelheim housed everyone she loved in the world, but she had seen its destruction from afar. Kalm was a small town and that catastrophe happened under the cover of night. Something about the bright orange light of the last rays of sun made the death and destruction of Cosmo Canyon vivid and unreal.

It was a center of might for Shinra. It lay broken before them—broken by only one man. Cloud tried to stop her, but Tifa began to check the faces of bodies. There was an elevator perched unevenly on cracked tarmac. The tarmac by its side was shattered. Tifa approached and as she turned the corner into the elevator tripped on something soft and slick. She looked down. That was a mistake. She stepped out of the elevator, wretched over, and began to vomit.

Cloud scowled and approached. "What is it, Tifa?"

Tifa waved him away. "Don't look! Just… One of the Turks. I think… The woman." She wobbled and struggled to retain her balance.

Cait Sith wriggled away from Tifa. No one in AVALANCHE knew exactly how its operator controlled the cat, but its movements were awkward in the aftermath of her sickness. "He's gone," the cat said.

"Sephiroth?" Cloud said."

Caith Sith nodded. "He flew away and then they lost him."

"What about Rufus Shinra?" Cloud said.

"He and three of the Turks excaped on his private plane."

Yuffie ran closer. "What about Aerith?"

The cat flailed its arms. "I'm listening to, like, three conversations at once on encrypted frequencies and no one knows."

Tifa rose to her feet and screamed into the night. "Aerith!"

Something moved from about twenty meters away—debris shifted and rustled aside. Yuffie reached for a shuriken. Cloud drew his buster sword.

"Aerith?" Yuffie said, stepping closer.

Tifa stopped her. Maybe it was something that lingered from their telepathic contact weeks before. Something in Tifa's mind still tingled a little at Aerith's presence. Whatever was rising from the debris was not Aerith.

A tattered form emerged dressed in the plain blue suit of a prisoner. His face was obscured behind the setting sun and the darkness of his long, oily hair. He was slender and pale. When he spoke, it was in a high, crackling voice. "Cloud Strife. Is that you?"

Cloud froze, immobilized.

The figure swaggered closer. "And Tifa Lockhart?"

Cloud clenched his sword. "I'll kill him!"

Yuffie gaped and grabbed Cloud's shoulder. "Cloud? What the hell?"

Cait Sith glanced back and forth between the two.

The figure chuckled. "Still reasoning with your sword, I see…"

Tifa narrowed her eyes. "Professor… Hojo?"

Cait Sith gasped. "Is… is… that really Professor Hojo? _The_ Professor Hojo?"

The tired old man hobbled closer. The pale glow of flame illuminated his chimeric smile. "I see my boy has been busy."

* * *

_A/N: I've been shooting for about once a month updates, so I'm a bit behind schedule. I hope to get back on track in the coming months. There's a new summary up as I've never been happy with the old one. Also, due to reader feedback, Aerith has been added to the character code. Thanks for reading!_


	12. Chapter 12: The Last Cetra

**12**

**The Last Cetra**

Tifa still physically held Cloud back, but it took less effort. He stood, too surprised to resist her. They stared at the tired figure before them.

"Your boy?" Tifa said.

Professor Hojo sat on a small mound of rubble. He did not seem to care that an ex-SOLDIER standing ten feet away meant to hurt him or that blasts still echoed through the canyon. "Yes," he said in a high, deliberate voice. "I suppose it was never widely known that Sephiroth Crescent was my son."

Cloud shook Tifa away. "Are you serious?" he said.

Was Hojo grimacing or smiling? "The last time I ever saw him was that day in Nibelheim. Before you ran away, Cloud Strife."

"Sephiroth never knew his father," Cloud said. "He told Zack and me that when we got to Nibelheim."

"I suppose you could say I was never a particularly good father," Hojo said.

"That's an understatement," Cloud said.

"It does not take a lot to become a father, Cloud. Just good aim…"

Tifa rolled her eyes and walked off.

"Professor Hojo, you were supposed to be locked up in the most secure prison in all of Gaia," Cait Sith said.

An oil tanker exploded in the distance.

Hojo shrugged. "I'm not anymore."

"How did you know Sephiroth did this?" Yuffie asked.

"Well, from my vantage point, which was a gaping hole in the ground he made, I could clearly see him throwing fireballs through the air. He gets it from his mother. You see, I was always more of a lover than a fighter."

Tifa emerged from behind a personnel carrier. "Will all of you just shut up and help me look?"

They turned.

"We're wasting our time," Tifa said. "Aerith's gone! We have to find her."

Hojo's eyes narrowed. "Aerith… that name sounds so familiar…"

"She's no friend of yours," Tifa said. "And she was here until just a few minutes ago. He might have…"

Hojo's eyes brightened and he chuckled a sadistic chuckle. "Oh. That girl. The one my boy tried to take."

Tifa's eyes widened. "Where is she?"

"Taken," Hojo said.

Yuffie gasped. "By Sephiroth?"

"No," Hojo said. "By Vincent Valentine."

"Vincent Valentine? The Turk?" Cait Sith said. "But he was on Cell Bloc Five. I saw him when we left."

Hojo rubbed his wrists: chafed as though they had been shackled. "A Turk, did you say?"

"Right…" Cait Sith said.

Hojo chortled. "Oh Vincent, what a tangled web we weave…"

"Where is he?" Tifa said.

"You want to find Vincent Valentine?" Hojo said. "I think I can take you to him."

"Bullshit," Cloud said.

Tifa gaped. "Cloud!"

"What the hell's gotten into you?" Yuffie said. "You're not usually like this, Cloud."

"If only you saw what we saw the day Jenova awakened." Cloud pointed at Hojo. "He was there. He didn't look surprised and he sure as hell didn't look upset."

Hojo gazed into the sky. His eyes were strangely unfocused, but it was a look of disoriented wonder. He was not a young man, but he looked ancient.

"Where are Aerith and Vincent?" Tifa said.

Hojo turned to her, as though surprised by her presence. "I can only guess, but I have a good guess. A long ways away. I will have to show you."

Tifa swallowed. "What is he?"

"I will have to show you that as well," Hojo said. "You would never believe the truth about Vincent Valentine if I told you." He brushed his pants, stood, and stretched. "This is all quite charming. I have not smelled the night air in months. Years. I don't know."

Tifa grimaced. To her, there was nothing pleasant about this acridic night air. "Show us."

Cloud frowned. "Tifa!"

"She's our friend, Cloud. What choice do we have?"

Cait Sith pulled on Tifa's miniskirt. Cloud glowered when he realized the mechanical cat's location at her leg, looking up… "Can we trust him?" the machine whispered. Hojo was paying attention to them in short bursts. He did not seem to be at the moment.

"No," Tifa said. "But what other choice do we have?"

Cloud frowned. There was no good way to answer that question and he remained silent.

* * *

Aerith awakened and did not know where she was or how she got there. It was daytime. She knew this only on account of the glimmer of light filtering in past the tattered crimson window shades. A grandfather clock across from her in the room was no help. It was stuck at two o-five. The cobwebs strung across its hands suggested it had been frozen at that time for a very long time. The clock seemed to have housed several generations of spiders over the years before the spiders had finally given up on its potential to attract anything living.

She was in a bedroom. She guessed the mattress was a king-sized. She had never been in one herself, but it was about as wide as it was long. The carpet was a dark blue, but for its dustiness, it looked nearly gray-black. It was in serious need of vacuuming.

Every inch of the room was in serious need of manteinance of some sort or another. The stale air of death hovered throughout. The yellowing wallpaper once bore a print of some sort or another, but it was unidentifiable for its grime and decay. Either Aerith was the room's first occupant in a while or its occupant regarded the room with apathy.

It was as she tried to discern the particular gothic style of the room that Aerith realized with alarm she was naked under the covers. The last thing she remembered was being taken by Vincent Valentine. Her grogginess wore off and fear crept in in its place.

Aerith gained courage as she absorbed the absolute quiet of her surroundings and her eerie loneliness. She finally stood and walked across the dusty carpet. There was a note on a far dresser. Aerith picked it up.

_You are unharmed. Your clothing required washing. The bathroom is functional. A new dress you may wear is on the bed. You must not leave until we speak later this evening. You will find biscuits on the nightstand._

Aerith looked up into the tarnished mirror. She almost jumped at her own reflection. It looked so unlike her. Dried copper-brown speckled her neck, face, and hair. There were even splotches across her bare chest. Her dress must have been saturated with blood. Disturbingly, Aerith was relieved it was not her own blood. Most of it had been the blood of others.

And then Aerith wondered where she had gotten that black eye. She had not seen herself in the mirror since Kalm's destruction about three days prior. Maybe it was from the collapse of Tellah's house. Maybe it was when Sephiroth manhandled her, either in Kalm or in Cosmo Canyon.

Whatever the case, Aerith knew she needed to make some changes in her life.

As soon as she figured out where in all of Gaia she was.

As promised, a frilly beige dress with poofed shoulders lay strewn across the bed. It was the sort her mother Elmyra had in her closet—the ones that were hand-me-downs from _her_ mother. And then Aerith looked across the bed to her nightstand and noticed the tray of biscuits. She had every reason not to eat them. Apart from apparently saving her life, she had no particular reason to trust Vincent Valentine. She picked one up. It was light for its size; no longer warm, but not yet dried around the edges. It had been made not long before.

Aerith walked across the room to the window and peered out. The town of wood and brick was in a state of complete ruin. Nothing lived here. Nothing had lived here in a long time. Even the animals themselves seemed to avoid this place. Shinra had cursed it into nonbeing.

Even though she had never been here before, it rang of familiarity. It looked just like Tifa had described it. Mt. Nibel looked just like she imagined it would.

Aerith stared out the window for unknown minutes until she finally remembered the biscuit in her hand. She took a small bite. She was too hungry to care if she was to be poisoned. He had kidnapped her and undressed her while unconscious. It did not seem as though he had done anything bad to her. It seemed like she was safe. For now.

The biscuit was good. Almost as good as her mother used to make. She had been taken hostage by a mysterious Turk with an inhuman aura who could morph into a monter and bake a nice biscuit.

Aerith wanted to laugh at her situation. She wanted to laugh at the state of her life. Instead, she began to cry. When she tried to stop crying, she began to sob. She was scared. She was lonely. She missed her mother more than ever. She hoped these tears would cleanse her of pain and heartache and she would never have to cry like that again.

Still, she knew there would be more crying to come.

* * *

Room service stopped by for the fourth time in an hour. It was a "storm day special." Wind wiped palm trees outside in a late morning sky as dark as night. The cabana boy wore a thick poncho over a button-down short-sleeve shirt and carried a tattered umbrella that barely shielded his trio of cocktails. He was friendly and calm. Just the same, Tseng told him if he offered one more fruity drink, he would buy it and throw it in his face.

Tseng slammed the door and approached the little planning table to rejoin the others. Reno had never seen him in such a dark mood. It was understandable. For two years, he had her under surveilance. He watched her come and go from her home; sell flowers; help out at the orphanage. She was a genuinely good human being—much better than any of them could ever hope to be.

Rufus was in a dark mood himself. As soon as he heard that the Cetra girl, Aerith, was gone and her special materia most likely taken, Reno recognized something before unseen in their president: he realized somehow, somewhere he had screwed up. He would never admit it, but it was true.

And then there was Elena. Tseng had not reciprocated her feelings. He could not have. In some ways maybe that made it harder.

The Tiny Bronco had a limited fuel supply. It was a one-of-a-kind airplane: a personal transport for Rufus Shinra, but not meant for long range. It made it back to Costa Del Sol, but could travel no further. Beach resorts were only as nice as the weather and this weather was horrible by any reckoning. The tropical depression ensured that they would not make it back to Midgar for another day or so and communication was spotty. The room of their guest cabin was tight for four.

It was too small for so many elephants in the room.

Thunder cracked outside. The walls creaked. "We don't know for a fact Sephiroth took her," Tseng said. "She may be hiding in the wreckage."

"They lost visual on her from the surveillance camera," Reno said. "The hell was that anyhow?"

Rude grimaced.

"We need to search the Temple of the Ancients," Rufus finally said. He had to raise his voice to speak over the rain hammering the roof. "Maybe he'll go there. If he has the White Materia."

"I'd advise we send out an advance party from the third battalion," Tseng said. "Until we get back to Midgar."

Rufus nodded. "We need a team on the ground now. Someone needs to go back to Cosmo Canyon and search for evidence of what happened."

Tseng sat forward. "I called them in a few minutes ago."

Reno and Rude glanced back and forth between themselves and Tseng. "Who?" Reno said.

Tseng leaned back in his chair. "The elite among the elite. They were taken off active duty six years ago. When the last President Shinra built up SOLDIER, he also severely weakened the Turks."

"Oh yeah?" Reno said. "What'd he do that for?"

"He questioned our loyalty." Tseng nodded to Rufus. Rufus nodded back. "I kept hold of them though. They've been integrated into Public Safety and I made sure they could be recalled to Turk active duty at a minute's notice."

"So you're sayin' you've got some Legion of B-list Turks out there?" Reno said.

Tseng arched an eyebrow. "Not B-list, Reno. Nothing of the sort. No. They can mobilize anywhere in the world. Between them, they speak a dozen dialects. They can operate with the utmost stealth; blend in; get any job done, and escape unnoticed. No, they're the stuff of legend."

"If they're the stuff of legend, how come I ain't ever heard of them," Reno said.

"Because they were never meant to be heard," Tseng said.

"Reno rolled his eyes. "Great. Stealth fighters. So are you going to introduce them to us or are you going to wait until we hear about their deaths in some fiery catastrophe on the news?"

"You talk now Reno, but you'll see," Tseng said. "You'll see."

* * *

The most legendary of all Turks adjusted his shades and peered through the chopper's windshield. His feet rested on the control panel. He was nonchalant. An outsider might have mistaken him for being lax or lazy. Only those who knew him well—and they were few—understood why he they called him the "Death God of the Battlefield" during the Wutai campaigns. "What is that out there?"

"It's a class VI Buggy. Shinra Public Safety transport," the blond woman with short hair in the co-pilot seat said. She was doing all of the flying and looked increasingly annoyed. "The treads match."

The square-jawed martial-artist tossed a playing card onto the retractable table across from his companion: the dark-haired woman with steely eyes. He frowned. "Why don't they get SOLDIER to do this?"

The woman's eyes narrowed. They were cool, steely eyes: eyes that conveyed chillingly little emotion. "To say you can fight fire with fire is silly. Once a fire rages, only water can extinguish it."

A girl with long, dirty blond hair cleaned her shotgun barrel. "That, like, makes no sense at all. Can you, like, not talk in Wutainese kuons all the time?"

The dark-haired woman tossed down a card and mumbled something impolite under her breath.

A man—a boy really—with curly blond hair leaned against the chopper wall. Large nunchaku draped across his back. "SOLDIER is protecting Midgar," he said.

A red-haired man across from him shrugged. "I heard something different. I don't think Shinra trusts SOLDIER all that much anymore."

"What do you mean?" the blond boy said.

"Well," the red-haired man said. "Think about it. All of the First Classes either died, flaked out, or defected. Plus, General Sephiroth is our real enemy now."

The woman with short blond hair in the cockpit peered past the heads-up display. They were nearing the arid foothills of Mt. Nibel. This road was traveled lightly. There was very little reason to go to Nibelheim anymore. The small vehicle rolled over rock, stone, and shrubbery ahead. "Guys, we're about a kilometer out from the buggy."

A man with dark hair and a jagged scar across his face stepped sat upright from against the wall. "Hey, any of you guys see the new play, 'Loveless,' yet?"

The legendary Turk sighed. "Will you stop talking about that already?"

The dark-haired man shifted. "It was a good play."

"It's fuckin' gay, man," the legendary Turk said. "Seriously, is there so little little to do in Midgar we can't stop talking over and over again about the same fuckin' book and play?"

"Guys," the blonde in the cockpit said. "That's it. It's got to be them."

"We better get ready," the woman with the shotgun said. Her shotgun was completely disassembled.

"Yeah," the dark-haired, scarred man said. "They ain't that tough. I ran into them a few times when I was with Corneo." He turned back to the legendary Turk. "Seriously, it's a good play."

"Maybe better than that opera shit you used to go on about," the Legendary Turk said.

From the cockpit, the details of the buggy became clear. That was definitely the one missing from Cosmo Canyon rumbling across the barren rock and grasse of the steppe heading northeast fast. A hatch on top of it opened. A light flashed from its opening. A warning sensor flashed on the chopper's panel. A vapor trail traveled closer and closer. "Um… guys…?" the pilot said.

The Legendary Turk shrugged and hopped to his feet. "So, is it true Cissnei puts out?"

* * *

The chopper exploded in a ball of fire. Smoldering bits of armored hull and propeller scattered across the dusty ground behind and then vanished into the late afternoon sun.

Yuffie smiled and nodded with approval. She closed the hatch to the transport and returned to the stale olive interior with the others.

"Where did you find that rocket launcher, Yuffie?" Tifa said.

Yuffie set it in the corner by a tangled mass of seatbelts and buckles. No one, not even Cloud, knew exactly what they were for, but they seemed about right for securing a rocket launcher. The ride was a little bumpy, but nothing compared to the truck ride to Junon. "You find the damndest things in a war zone."

From the driver's seat, Cloud glanced over his shoulder.

Tifa munched on a Shinra Public Safety ration. If she never saw another ration again, she would be happy. "Who were they?"

Yuffie shrugged. "Some kinda Shinra. Who cares? They were following us. Now they're not. And when do you care so much all of a sudden about people who are trying to kill us?"

Tifa pointedly looked away.

"You haven't been right ever since this mess started in Sector Five," Yuffie said.

"Can we talk about this later?" Tifa said.

"When is later anyhow? There's always going to be another later," Yuffie said.

Hojo chuckled from the transport's corner. They had all but forgotten about him. He rested against the wall. In the bright white fluorescent light of the vehicle, he looked even more unkempt and sickly, but he smirked even more when the girls glared. "Sorry. I like my Wutai women feisty."

Yuffie pointed to Hojo. "So what are we doing with him if we get back Aerith anyhow?"

"I could think of a few things…" Hojo said.

Tifa and Yuffie blanched at the same time.

"He knows a lot about us now. And he's just another reason for Shinra to come after us," Yuffie said.

"Shinra thinks Aerith's dead," Cait Sith said. "I think we're going to be bumped to much lower priority now that Sephiroth is at it again." The mechanical cat sat on one of the scantly-padded metal benches across from Tifa and Yuffie. The vehicles were designed to transport half a platoon into battle. Their voices echoed inside with so few passengers.

"Eat something Yuffie," Tifa said. "You're going to get sick if you don't eat anything all day." She wanted to add that Yuffie was also unbearably grumpy, but thought better of it. She _was_ the one who knew how to operate the rocket launcher.

The cabin jostled as the vehicle skipped over over an obstacle. The rocket launcher tipped over and out of its buckling and landed on its side. Yuffie clutched her mouth and rushed for the hatch above. An unappealing wretching sound made its way back into the cabin. She wiped her mouth and stumbled back inside.

"Where the hell are we?" Yuffie said. "Aren't there… like… roads here or something?"

"We never had nice roads like there are in Midgar," Tifa said.

"Why are they in Nibelheim?"

The transport's passengers turned at Cloud's voice.

"Why is Vincent Valentine in Nibelheim, Hojo?" Cloud said.

"He's from there," Hojo said. "Not originally, but he lived there for a long, long… long time."

Tifa shook her head. "No. Nibelheim's a small town. My father was the mayor. I knew of everyone who lived there."

"He hadn't lived there for a while when I moved my research into his old home," Hojo said.

"His old home?" Tifa said. "You mean Shinra Mansion?"

"That is correct, young lady," Hojo said.

"That couldn't have been his house," Tifa said. "It was vacant for a long time before Shirna bought it. It's older than anyone can remember."

"So is Vincent Valentine," Hojo said.

"What is he?" Cloud said.

Hojo sighed. "I was hoping things would explain themselves and I could save time on exposition… I may as well tell you now what Vincent is. But as I told you before, I promise you won't believe me."

"Try us," Tifa said.

Hojo told them.

No one believed him.

* * *

Though she stared out the bedroom window, Aerith did not hear him approach the front door, but the sudden scraping of steel-toed boots on old cedar floor signaled the presence of another. He was far away enough that she could not sense his presence at first, but she stretched her mind out: that was the only way she could describe the indescribable act of telepathy. The twitchy, scratchy chaos of his inhuman aura prickled her own.

She descended the long staircase, her heart skipping faster with every step; unwanted fear crept back, but somehow that fear was less than the fear of not knowing that had gripped her for hours upon her arrival.

He was in the kitchen. She could tell that much. She had explored the mansion thoroughly; tried to leave but found the doors tightly sealed. Not even the blunt part of an end table had scratched the doors bolted by some too-powerful force. The end-table was destroyed. She hoped he would not miss it. She could have tried a window, but aborted her escape attempts at the thought of broken glass.

She crept through the doorway. He did not see her at first. He no longer wore the blue suit of a Turk, but a long, red cape and black leathers. It was a rustic, anachronistic outfit.

He stood by the sink, cleaning and butchering a skinned rabbit. It was mid-afternoon and she was hungry. Just the same, Aerith almost gagged. Maybe Tifa would have laughed at her for this. Aerith was a proud urbanite. She had never before eaten rabbit—never before eaten anything that was not prepackaged in a plastic-wrapped carton, irrecognizable as the remains of a living thing. She remembered her conversation with Vincent on the Big Whale. Vegetarianism was starting to sound good after all.

The floor creaked beneath her feet. She grimaced. He looked up and glanced over his shoulder. She held his attention for a couple of seconds and then he turned back to the bloodied remains of the rabbit.

"So I see you showered," he said.

Aerith inhaled and leaned against the wall. She had been dreading this moment all day, but though she found him particularly unreadable, she did not feel threatened. "I did. Three days was long enough without one."

He rinsed the carcass and placed it on a cutting board. With an ancient-looking kitchen knife and a practiced hand, he sliced it across the joints into small pieces that looked almost like chicken breasts and drumsticks. It now would not have been out of place in one of Aerith's supermarket meat cartons.

"What are you doing?" Aerith said.

"Preparing our supper tonight," Vincent said.

Aerith felt a new wave of queasiness. She liked evoking Tifa's presence, even if she imagined Tifa laughing at her.

"The dress suits you," Vincent said.

"Thanks," Aerith said. It was old-fashioned, but something about the color brought out her eyes. Still, something about it made her uncomfortable. "Who did it belong to?"

He had not expected the question and it froze him. "Her name was Lucrecia."

Aerith waited for an elaboration.

"I estimated you two were about the same size," Vincent said. "I see I was correct."

That was as much of an ellaboration as she would get.

Aerith stood on the corner for several more minutes as Vincent pulled out a new cutting board and began to slice a carrot and onion. The silence was maddening. She had so many questions they formed a bottleneck in her mind. She hoped he would be the first to speak, but he would not.

Most pressing in her mind were why had he saved her from Sephorith? What was he? What did he want from her? She settled on the least ambitious of her questions. "What are we doing in Nibelheim?" she said.

"Because I lived here for almost a century," he said. "It was far too long. I became suspicious. Still, it's as close to a real home as I have."

Aerith blinked.

"You're surprised by my candor," he said as he turned the old electric burner on to heat a pot of water. "I see no reason to lie to you about anything anymore," he said. "I intend to tell you everything. Over dinner. I'm sure you have a lot of other questions."

"What do you want from me?" Aerith said.

"Only what you're willing to give," Vincent said. "I've been searching for you for a long, long time. After the incident here in Nibelheim, I knew Shinra itself would lead me to you. That's why I've been wearing the costume of a Turk."

Aerith swallowed. "That thing you became in Cosmo Canyon…?"

"The Galleon Beast. It was a manifestation of the powers of Gaia within me. Its use remains my last connection to the Lifestream: the Blue Magic I learned centuries ago."

Aerith shyed back. "You…"

Vincent turned. His crimson eyes had never seemed more alien. "They call you the last Cetra, but you're only a halfbreed. _I'm_ the last Cetra."


	13. Chapter 13: Nibelheim

**13**

**Nibelheim**

It was starting to feel like a date. Not the sweet, spontaneous, fun dates she and Zack went on. No, it was a slow, laborious one—one in which she and her date just were not clicking.

The gothic chandelier overhead cast pale yellow light through the dining room and its rich mahogany furniture. What a generation ago must have seemed ambient and warm now seemed dull and a bit creepy. The wallpaper downstairs was in as much disrepair as the wallpaper upstairs: its reds and greens stained a peculiar brown. The table had lost its gloss long ago.

Vincent took a bit out of his food: a rustic rabbit stew nestled among boiled potatoes. He looked at her occasionally in brief, thoughtful spells. He fit in _perfectly_ here.

Aerith still eyed the stew with suspicion. "How does this building get power and water?"

Vincent sipped from his goblet of red wine. "A backup generator. It could power this building for a week. Though Nibelheim was destroyed, since this building was damaged so little, it's still fully functional."

Aerith nodded and took a bite of the stew. He was a practiced cook. Maybe that was an inevitable byproduct of several centuries of life.

"How is it?" Vincent said.

Aerith's stomach still churned a bit at the thought of the bloodied rabbit. Though she had eaten little all day, she still was not very hungry. "It's a little salty to my taste."

Vincent scowled. "I'm sorry?"

"Salty. I said it's a bit salty. Otherwise good though."

"The Turks never complained my food was too salty. In fact, they praised me for my cooking. Most people have."

"Well…" Aerith blinked. "I'm sorry. I mean, it's not like it's bad or anything. I'm just saying… I don't like things too salty."

Vincent shrugged it off with another sip of wine.

"That rabbit…" Aerith said. "Did you…?"  
"I shot it," Vincent said. "Many animals live closer to the foothills, away from the ruins."

Aerith frowned. "You're like me aren't you?" she said.

Vincent half-smiled.

"When a living thing loses its life, doesn't it make you… sad? I mean, can't you feel its soul? Sense its distress?"

Vincent's smile faded. "The Cetra were born with innate empathic powers. Perhaps you've heard. I lost mine long ago."

"What happened?"

He ignored the question. "What of you? You asked me how I can kill a living thing, but ours was not a civilization of vegetarians. You were a flower girl. Did it not pain you to cut the stems of the flowers you sold?"

Aerith looked down. "In a way… but it's hard to explain. They were planted by me and raised for me… So it's almost as though they understood that was their purpose. I can't feel plants like I can feel animals, but it's almost as though they were happy to be cut and sold by me. I'd instilled in them that purpose in creating them."

"Then perhaps it's the same with the animals all around and us."

"That seems to me rather presumptious."

Vincent paused mid-way through sipping his wine. "If only I'd known the second to last of our kind was such a provincial child."

"If only you'd known then _what_?"

He inhaled and exhaled, slowing his racing thoughts. "Maybe I wouldn't have searched for you for quite so many years."

Aerith set down her fork. At last, they were getting somewhere. "Why were you searching for me? How did you even know about me? Why _me_?"

"Because… we're the last."

"That's impossible. I mean, there have to be others. Don't there? Somewhere."

"You don't think I've tried tracking down others? We're a long lived race, but the older generation has finally died off. There were so few of us and we documented our lineage well."

"My mother was still alive until recently," Aerith said.

Vincent sneered. "Yes. Your mother. I had neither seen nor heard from Ifalna for years. I tried to find her, but she didn't want to be found. To think she ran off with a human and assimilate into their wretched society."

Though Aerith had no real memory of her birth mother and little sentimental attachment to her, she disliked something in his tone. "I'm half human. I was raised by humans."

"Nobody's perfect."

Aerith sighed.

Vincent shrugged. "I'm too old to be, what does your kind say? 'Politically correct?' I've seen that kind of relationship happen between our peoples countless times. It has never ended well. My consort of many years left me for a human and died not long after."

"This Lucrecia you mentioned? She was a Cetra too?"

Vincent ignored her question. Again. "So to answer in short, I searched for you because I finally discovered Ifalna had a child, but only after her demise. You seemed to have diappeared into thin air. I suspected Shinra knew about the incident and so I set about posing as a young human seeking a life in the military. It was easy, you see. Cetra biology is superficially close enough to humans that I went undetected. I tried to downplay my special talents as not to draw attention, but I caught the eye of the Turks. And it was a good thing I did. After the destruction of Nibelheim and the recovery of Hojo's documents, the Turks found you. They tracked you for a couple of years before President Shinra the senior was killed."

Aerith had noticed for years fleeting thoughts directed at her: feelings that she was being watched. Uncertain of the source of her powers, she had half-way chalked it up to a stroke of madness. "What killed my mother?"

"I would very much like to find out. She knew a great deal about JENOVA and Omega Weapon." He pointed to her bust line. Aerith was once again wearing her mother's materia around her neck. "If only you know the power of your accessories."

"Rufus Shinra told me," Aerith said. "He showed me tapes of my mother. I know all about Jenova and Omega Weapon. So this is the White Materia, isn't it?"

Vincent gave her a long, measured look. "Then I suppose I may tell you I brought you here because the world is coming to an end. The human world at least. Omega will be summoned and destroy all enemies of the planet."

"And you're sure that means that all of humanity will die?"

"Yes."

* * *

Both Cloud and Tifa tended to be quiet. It was no surprise that they did not initiate much conversation late into the day-long drive to Nibelheim. Still, Yuffie knew something was wrong when they stopped responding to her entirely. She knew they were almost there.

Yuffie was unsure what she had been expecting. The eerie silence struck her. She had not expected the sounds of cities and towns to which she had grown accustomed. They were in the wilderness, but even the sounds of animals and monsters were mute. It was unnatural. But then, so were the bomb-blasted hulls of decayed buildings littering the streets; maybe unchanged for two years.

The buggy rumbled through the narrow main street of the ruined town. Yuffie realized something had changed in two years. There are no bodies. It was as though nothing alive had ever existed here.

From the top of the buggy, Tifa yelled inside. "Cloud. Stop."

The vehicle ground to a hault. Tifa vaulted over the edge and sprinted towards a two-story building, its roof and half its façade: gone.

"Tifa, wait up!" Yuffie cried. Cloud came out the rear hatch and followed her.

Hojo watched Tifa with the observant eyes of a raptor as she bounded across the abandoned street. "Are you thinking what I am thinking, Miss Kisaragi?"

"What's that?" Yuffie said.

Hojo's eyes fixated on Tifa even more intently. "They're real. Aren't they?"

Yuffie blinked. "What are you… you mean…?" It occurred to her where Hojo was staring. "Ugh. Creep."

* * *

Tifa struggled to reach the second floor bedroom. The staircase was half-destroyed and she had to leap across the span of five steps. Had she expected it to be exactly as she had left it? The house's roof was gone. Shingles, scrap wood, and plaster littered the floor, her nightstand, and her sun-bleached covers. The old piano seemed stranglely untouched by big debris, but was covered in a layer of dust and ash. She would have not seen it if she had not known its location by heart.

She removed the key cover, following a strange whim, she pressed a few key. B-flat was a little wobbly, but identifiable for what it was. How had that song gone again?

Piano practice into the night; pleasant but quiet dinners for two with her father; long chats with the hired help: they were all relics from another time as though half-imagined. Tifa much more easily remembered the dawn of her teenaged years: the sadness, loneliness, and alienation that accompanied her to womanhood and led to her life as a hermit. And then before she could reconcile those alien feelings, her world ended.

She did not know how long she sat at the old piano trying to conjure the tune: her feebile attempt at necromancy. How did that song go again? There was C, D, E, B, A, and the rest was a blur. At least it was a blur loud enough to drown out the cocophonous swell of deep, long-forgotten feelings. Finally, she heard Yuffie's scream.

Tifa ran down the stairs, leaping past the bomb damage, and ran outside. From outside of the buggy, Yuffie pointed further up the main road.

Aerith: safe, healthy, and clean, if oddly dressed, ran towards them.

Tifa sprinted. After spanning a hundred yards, she tackled Aerith by accident.

The well of feelings finally overwhelmed her. The warm glow of Aerith's presence enveloped her and all at once, she sobbed.

Aerith held her and Tifa pretended to believe everything was right with the world.

* * *

They talked all the way to Shinra Mansion. Tifa and Aerith did at least. Yuffie could not get a word in edgewise. Cloud and Cait Sith walked along in silent reticence.

Hojo chortled. "Such a lovely town. It brings back such memories. Does it not, Cloud?"

Cloud glared, but Hojo seemed relatively unfazed. Could he even do anything to Hojo Shinra had not already done tenfold? Cloud pulled the door handles and entered the gothic building. His footsteps echoed through the tall, dank promenade. He reached for his Buster sword.

"Vincent's not going to hurt us, Cloud," Aerith said. "He could have done that long ago if he'd really wanted to."

Cloud arched an eyebrow. His hand still lingered at the sword. He walked towards the kitchen.

Aerith turned to Yuffie.

"Why are you trusting him all of a sudden?" Yuffie said. "He tried to kidnap you. He shot me. You can be too forgiving, you know."

"There's a lot we've got to talk about," Aerith said. "As far as why I trust him..."

Vincent stood at the sink, pre-rinsing dishes. He glanced over when he heard their footsteps. "I warned her this country has not been safe for many years. She knew it was you. She doesn't worry as much as is healthy..."

Vincent finally turned to look at them. He froze for a fraction of a second. His sleeves were rolled up—his non-mechanical hand covered in sudsy dishsoap. It dropped to his beltline and he drew his pistol: the vicious tri-barelled one confiscated by AVALANCHE and then Shinra.

Cloud drew his sword and brought it to bear on Vincent.

Aerith cried, "Stop."

Yuffie, Tifa, and Cait Sith stammered in a chorus of confusion.

"Vincent, what's going on?" Aerith said.

Vincent's aim was unflinching. "Move, Cloud Strife."

"I'm not letting you hurt my friends," Cloud said.

Vincent gestured past Cloud. "You call that man behind you friend?"

Cloud turned and saw a surprised but somehow still smug Hojo.

Vincent cocked his gun. "Move, I said. Move so I can shoot him."

Cloud lowered his weapon. Then he moved.

"Cloud?" Aerith jumped in front of both of them, blocking Vincent's line of sight to Hojo.

"You don't think I'll shoot through you if I need to?" Vincent said.

"No, I don't," Aerith said.

Vincent closed his eyes. He inhaled; gathered patience. "Do you have any idea who that is?"

Aerith stood, unflinching. "Does it matter?"

"That _thing,_" Vincent said, "Is Shinra's Professor Hojo."

Aerith looked over her shoulder and scowled incredulously. "_Really?_"

Yuffie rolled her eyes. "I guess you two know each other, huh, Vincent?"

"We go back. So did you intend to move or not, Aerith?"

Hojo laughed. Something about its unsettling warble and pitch made everyone but Aerith retreat and made Vincent lower his weapon. "That's it," Hojo said. "Aerith. I've been trying to place you. You have your mothers's eyes, child."

Aerith stepped back as well. "You had those videos…"

"You've seen them then," Hojo said.

"What are you talking about, Aerith?" Tifa said.

"Yesterday, Rufus Shinra showed me video interviews my father conducted with my mother. My birth mother. He was a scientist named Gast Famis. She was the last Cetra." She glanced at Vincent. "Or so he thought."

Vincent clutched the pistol more tightly. He swallowed. As unreadable as she found his aura, Aerith felt him struggle for self-control. "Where are they?"

"Shinra has them," Aerith said. "Rufus Shinra told me he confiscated them from here."

"How did you get them, Hojo?" Vincent said.

Hojo's eyes sparkled in a way Aerith did not like at all. She finally noticed the strange, unnatural aura surrounding Hojo. It was unlike any she had ever encountered: voices in a major and a minor key singing in a calculated dischord. "I wonder, Vincent Valentine… How did I? Maybe I could show you better than I could tell you. I also wonder if Shinra found quite all of them…"

Aerith sighed, aware she was once again walking headlong into a setup.

* * *

The ground and second floors of Shinra Mansion were creepy. The basement even made Vincent want to get out as quickly as possible. Aerith could tell that as clearly as if he had said it. Maybe she was getting better at reading him after all.

Here, spiders still spun their webs throughout every corner of the room. Everything above ground was dead. Only cobwebs filled the rooms. Aerith imagined those spiders had starved for lack of food. These spiders were plentiful and well-fed. She did not want to know on what they dined. They were enormous.

Hojo proceeded deeper into the cool, dank basement past molded furniture and irregular chirping noises from the hollowed recesses of misplaced bricks. A cocktail of terrible stenches filled their noses. They passed a storage room filled with corroded tin cans and rotting vegetables and a narrow library with dessicated books. The basement seemed to resonate with a dark, scared, mean life force of its own.

Hojo shined his flashlight ahead into a room that absorbed its light into pure, heavy black. Aerith leaned against the wall, struck by dizziness and nausea. Tifa leaned closer; whispered to her. Aerith tried to shake it off.

She sensed an energy like Sephiroth Crescent's soul—something wrought of anger and hopelessness. Something evil was in there.

Hojo proceeded inside. His flashlight illuminated the dusty, webbed oak study. There were no personal belongings: only void where furniture should have been. Aerith knew Shinra must have confiscated it. The light flickered as he fidgeted with a smashed padlock. He opened the cabinet beneath and within it, he opened a secret inner compartment. Aerith could not see what he was doing, but the evil feeling came through strong and unfiltered. And then, by the time Hojo turned, the feeling was gone. Whatever wicked energy she thought she felt was no more.

Hojo flashed a video, like the ones Aerith watched in Cosmo Canyon. "I do so love home movies," he said.

"Are you sure you don't wish for me to shoot him?" Vincent whispered.

Yuffie ignored Vincent. "Why keep that one safe?"

Hojo's eyes sparkled again. They liked it even less. "Oh, you'll see…"

* * *

Aerith noted with a mix of sadness and loss this was probably the last time she would ever see her parents—her birth parents. It made her think about Elmyra and a new worry set in. Rufus Shinra told her she would be released. Even if he had not been lying, Aerith suspected that was off the table. Elmyra worried a lot and she was probably more worried about Aerith than she was about her. And what about her medicine? Was Shinra giving it to her right? How about at all?

They brought an old and dusty television with a warped screen upstairs. No one wanted to watch the video in the cellar lab. Hojo clicked it on and it was a brighter blue in the far left corner than anywhere else.

_Ifalna quirked her head. _"_Are you ready yet?" she said, her voice staticy._

_ Gast was adjusting their sound equipment off-screen. "Yeah, just a minute."_

_ "Mommy, can I have snack?" little Aerith said, also off-screen._

_ "Mommy and Daddy will be just a minute, Aerith," Iflana said. "Check on Patches, please." So Aerith had a pet of some sort back then._

_ "Okay," little Aerith said._

_ The camera jiggled. "Now, where was I?" Gast said. "Ah, yes. Tell me more about Omega Weapon. Your family is its gatekeeper."_

_ "Yes," Iflana said, sitting comfortably at Gast's desk. "Two materia, one black and one white were created. The Black would activate. The White would de-activate."_

_ "How would one control it?" Gast said._

_ Ifalna shook her head. "You can't. It has two positions. Off and on. When it's off, it rests dormant. When it's on, it will perceive any threat to the planet and destroy it. Again, only the lifeforce of a Cetra or Jenova, who is something of an artificial Cetra, will activate the materia inside the Temple of the Ancients."_

_ "Isn't it dangerous for the Materia even to exist?" Gast said._

_ Ifalna clutched a thin chain around her neck, tucked below the hem of her neckline. Dangling at its base was a stone of darkest black: like a spot on the film. It reflected no light: only absorbed it. "I haven't figured out how to destroy them yet. The only choice I have is to keep them safe and never let either out of my sight."_

_ Ifalna had _both_ materia._

_ Gast "hm'ed."_

_ Ifalna shrugged. "There aren't many of us left, but I suppose one can't be too careful with the fate of the world."_

_ "Mommy, is it snack time yet?" little Aerith called._

_ "One minute," Ifalna said. "Perhaps we could wrap this up soon?" For the first time, Aerith could see Ifalna was a patient woman, but did not share Professor Hojo's purported enthusiasm for home movies._

_ "Of course. I still wanted to ask you a little bit more of the history of the conflict and…"_

_ Ifalna hushed him. Her eyes closed for only a minute. "No… But why… Why would she…?"_

_ "Honey?" Gast said. "What's…?"_

_ Ifalna bolted upright. A shriek pierced the air. "Chaos! It's Chaos!" Gast tried to speak, but she drowned his voice. "Aerith, run! Now. I have to… I have to…"_

_ Dust and debris. The sound of a shattering window and wall. A scream. A fluttering of wings. The camera tipped over and revealed a big, inhuman foot with big, inhuman claws._

_ The screen blanked._

They could hear only the creaky breathing of blank floors. Neither Hojo nor Vincent nor the remainder of AVALANCHE spoke for almost a minute.

"What the motherfucker was that?" Yuffie finally said.

Vincent sat forward in his chair; on his face a look of sad resignation. "So it _was_ you, Lucrecia…"


	14. Chapter 14: Reckoning

**14**

**Reckoning**

Light from the rising sun trickled through the shades, flowing across the dark, coarse skin of his bare back. He lit a cigarette despite her gentle protests. He was muscular and strong, but had once been stronger. After years of service followed by years of retirement, his skin sagged where there were once great muscles. The jagged lines of his tattoos had faded with age. Something about the mornings made him old. It was the only time neither business nor the haze of alcohol could buffer the horrors lurking just behind his eyes.

He spoke without prompting: a broken record set to play by the act of being idle. "He should have never been a SOLDIER. The little shit was an amazing athlete. Amazing. I made him try out for the Abes. I'd always wanted to do it. I wasn't good enough for the pro circuit. Ever notice that? All men want to be their sons and all sons become their fathers. Even if they annoy the piss out of each other and their last words to you are, 'Dad, I hate you.'"

Scarlet sat upright, covering her nakedness. It was a strange thing to do after the night before, but as he sat so exposed to her, it felt wrong to be too exposed to him.

"I don't guess you would." The SOLDIER took a drag. "I shoulda stayed retired after the Wutai campaigns. They shoulda gotten rid of SOLDIER after that. The shit we did… What was worse was we fuckin' loved it. So, I mean, you can't blame me for not wishing that for my only son. He was all I had and I loved him even if he was a pansy-ass on his own.

"So he comes to me on his eighteenth birthday and tells me how he's gonna join up. Wants to go to strange, new places. Wants to meet new people." He took another drag. "I'll tell you, those Wutai dinks were some interesting folks. So I just laugh at him and think about those dinks. And I says to him… I says to him, 'You're gonna cry.'"

His eyes glazed across. His jaw clenched. His Adam's Apple pulsed. "Genesis Rhapsodus. Genesis fuckin' Rhapsodus. He shouldn'ta been in that training room. That freak shouldn't have existed. Sephiroth Crescent shoulda never existed. I shoulda stayed home to fish when the man I hate with every fuckin' bone in my body asks me to come back 'cause their shiny new SOLDIERs are all toast. But there's only so many fish you can catch. And there's only so much a guy like me who's only good at killing dinks can do."

Scarlet spoke. "Jecht…?"

"They shoulda never let that pansy-ass son of mine in SOLDIER. I wouldn't ripped off that drama freak's balls…"

"Jecht."

He turned with saucer-wide eyes.

"Why are you telling me all of this?" she asked.

"I haven't had a drink in eight hours." It both was and was not a real answer. She knew from experience without work or whiskey, he was unable to think of anything else.

She gathered her undergarments. "I need to get to Shinra Tower," she said.

He put out his cigarette butt. "Yeah. Yeah."

They dressed, neither looking at the other. Neither speaking. She was not touchy-feely in the morning. He liked that about her. She made her hair as best she could and he waited for her in the armor of a SOLDIER First Class.

She finally looked at him again. "You have to trust me, Jecht. I promise you I'll make it so nothing like that happens to someone else's son ever again."

He cracked a hollow smile. She never offered him anything. He had no wants. He had no desires beyond those of the body.

He lived the remainder of his days as one who was already dead and buried.

"Whatever you say, Sweetheart."

* * *

It was a long, eerie night. The bombshell came as AVALANCHE prepared to leave the breakfast table the morning after their arrival in Nibelheim. Aerith just finished her last bite of sausage: a peculiar-tasting, possibly homemade concoction Vincent fried up. She thought it best not to ask from what it was made. She, Tifa, and Cait Sith had talked into the night. Yuffie, who slept somewhere private and secret, would be the last to hear.

Tifa had seen Yuffie mad before, but seldom this mad. "What the hell do you mean we're not going to Wutai?"

"Calm down, Yuffie," Tifa said.

Aerith followed Yuffie into the mansions foyer. "I have to find out what happened in Icicle Inn. This could mean life or death for the planet."

"Okay, that's all well and good, but _you're_ not a wanted terrorist," Yuffie said.

"Shinra is still looking for her," Tifa said. She did not elaborate: did not want to suggest Aerith would not be fine on her own. The thought had occurred to her.

Vincent approached, his organic hand still wet from breakfast dishwashing. "I'm going with her. It's dangerous."

"Me too," Tifa said. "We started down this path and I need to see it to the end."

Yuffie glared. "Cloud?"

Cloud avoided eye contact. He did not even have to answer Yuffie's question. Tifa was going.

"Cait?" Yuffie said.

The mechanical cat avoided looking straight at her as it fidgeted with its shoes. "I already booked them travel and want to make sure they stay safe at least until then. The only boats to that part of the Northern Continent that run this time of year are from Costa Del Sol. Tifa's right. This could get dangerous."

"Aerith's our friend, Yuffie," Tifa said.

Yuffie let out a dark chuckle. "Of course. We're doing it. We're all doing it. Aerith said so."

"Yuffie…" Tifa advanced a pace, but was stopped by Yuffie's sobs.

"I gave up everything to be in AVALANCHE, don't you get it?" Yuffie choked. "I had a home. It was a crappy, ruined one, but I gave it up so I could come to Midgar… the home of my sworn enemies… and try to do to them some of the shit they did to me. To my people."

Aerith approached. Tifa stopped her.

Yuffie stamped her fit, pouting. "Jessie. Wedge. Biggs. Marlene and Barret. Doesn't what happened to them mean anything to you all? They were your friends."

Aerith's heart pounded with growing ferocity. "Yuffie, my own mother was taken by Shinra. Don't you think I would go back to Midgar if I thought it would make a bit of difference? As long as Shinra doesn't know where I am, they can't use her to hurt me."

Yuffie stormed across the foyar towards the stairs and brushed past Aerith. "Whatever…"

Aerith started after her, but then Cloud's voice startled her.

"Let her go," he said.

Aerith froze and then turned to him.

"She has to fight her own demons. You can't do it for her." Cloud turned and walked towards the stairs himself.

Aerith still stood, stunned. Not only had Cloud spoken, but his words had been surprisingly deep. It was almost too much to take in.

Tifa sighed. "He has his moments. If only he had them more often."

* * *

Rufus' administrative assistant paged his desk. "Scarlet is on line one and wishes to discuss the vacant Public Safety head position."

Rufus waved his hand as though his administrative assistant were with him in his office. "Tell her I'm in an important meeting."

There was a pause. "Sir…"

"I have no interest in discussing the position with Scarlet, Ms. Trepe."

"Sir."

The approach to Rufus Shinra's desk was slow and when he was finally close, no one noticed him. Tseng, Reno, and Cissnei hovered with dark expressions, all staring at pictures piled atop Rufus' desk.

"It all comes back to… I just don't know how it could have happened. She was one of the best chopper pilots in all of Shinra."

Rufus did not speak. He snorted in a puff of air and closed his eyes.

"This isn't talent we can replace," Tseng said. "I'll take full responsibility. It's a serious loss. He was my senior to the Turks, you know. That Legendary Turk was. Veld had always hoped he would develop a passion for leadership and take over. The responsibility never appealed to him and he couldn't ever take anything seriously. Still, he was a far better soldier than I ever could be."

"We always used to talk during her cigarette break," Cissnei said. "She wanted so much out of life. She never used a gun, but she was one of the best shots we had. It's kind of funny. She… oh… What was her name again? You know. The Female Martial Artist?"

"Christ, Tseng," Reno said. "Who the fuck were these people anyway?"

Rufus put down the last of the pictures. "On the scale of failures, you haven't failed me much to this point, Tseng. Much."

It was half-way relieving and half-way threatening.

"Rude is on his way to the Temple of the Ancients," Tseng said. "We're going to see what we can find out. No one's seen Sephiroth since the attack on Cosmo Canyon."

Rufus nodded. "Keep me posted."

"What about AVALANCHE?"

Reno, Tseng, Cissnei, and Rufus turned to Reeve, waiting silently, his face tight and flushed.

Rufus met Reeve's glare. "What about them?"

"They're free now," Reeve said.

Rufus shrugged. "Public Safety's been notified to be on the lookout. Aerith Gainsborough is more than likely missing and with Sephiroth. I don't know what you want from me. The fate of the world is at stake. Do you really expect me to spend all of my resources tracking down a small band of logistically crippled terrorists?"

"They still pose a threat, Mr. President," Reeve said. "What's more, they just might know something about Sephiroth we don't."

Rufus visibly contemplated this.

"You're outta line, Reeve," Tseng said.

"I'm a Turk. Just like you all," Reeve was aware of the petulant note in his voice and unable to stop it.

"You should know your place by now," Reno said. He was being scolded for talking out of line by _Reno_.

Tseng's eyes narrowed. "Look Reeve…"

Reeve's lips tightened. "Cid."

Tseng shook his head. "What?"

Reeve laughed a high-pitched laugh. "Call me Cid. I know you all have been calling me Reeve, but don't you get it? For the past three years, I've been Cid to everyone but you. I studied astrophysics. I learned terrorist tactics. I helped bomb a damn mako reactor 'cause if I didn't it would have blown my cover. I let go of all my old friends in acquaintances, lost fifty pounds, and bleached my hair. Don't you get it? There is no fucking 'Reeve' anymore."

Reno listened with wide, startled eyes. "Look, slow down, buddy…"

Reeve went on. "Every minute of every day of my life for the past three years has been about bringing down AVALANCHE and now you're telling me to just drop it?"

Tseng raised his voice. "Listen, Reeve, I know you have a lot of personal feelings…"

And then Rufus hushed him. "Where do you think they are?"

"I don't know, but I can find them," Reeve said.

Rufus folded his hands and looked down in thought. "Contact the Tenth Platoon, Tseng. I believe Lieutenant Antilles has a score to settle with AVALANCHE as well. If he fails me again, I have little use for him."

Reeve stood erect.

"You'll deploy tomorrow morning, Reeve. You and a detachment from the Tenth Platoon. The Highwind will take you to the Cosmo Canyon site. From there, you'll go to work. I expect you to do better than Tseng's friends."

Tseng flinched.

Reeve's smile grew. "Sir… You're really…?"

"Don't misunderstand," Rufus said. "You said it yourself better than I ever could. You were a mid-level bureaucrat-turned double agent. What use do I have for you now? Fail me and I'll be very disappointed if I find you alive."

Reeve tried not to beam. The cruel words were a strange symphony to his ears. "You won't be sorry, sir."

"I expect I won't be," Rufus said.

Rufus' administrative assistant paged him once again. "Your ten-o'clock appointment is here, Mr. President."

"Send him in," Rufus said and then turned back to Tseng. "I trust you to make the necessary arrangements."

The double doors opened.

"And now," Rufus said, "If you'll pardon me, SOLDIER First Class Jecht and I need to discuss security protocols for Shinra Tower."

Tseng and Reno watched the old SOLDIER with caution; Reeve with bemusement, and Cissnei with vacancy.

The others left and Jecht sat across from Rufus—sat across from his enemy.

* * *

Yuffie packed her duffelbag in silent anger, apart from the others. The morning stretched into afternoon and the afternoon stretched further even as Cloud and Vincent, in an awkward moment of agreement, insisted they leave soon so they could travel for a while before it got too dark.

This time, Yuffie would not be traveling with them.

Vincent was really the only one with things to pack. He had apparently left this old life of his at the drop of a hat, so he had relatively little to do. Aerith had been busy, but taking her time, gathering provisions. Cait Sith waited with Tifa on the steps of Shinra Mansion.

Neither had anything to pack: one a machine and the other a shell of a woman with few worldly things: gloves, boots, a tank top, and an undersized miniskirt. Everything else had been left behind.

Tifa surveyed her hometown and the mechanical cat by her side that seemed always on the cusp of speaking, but would not. Though its emotes, or eerie lack thereof, she could almost sense real distress and concern in its faroff handler. Somehow, in that moment, it seemed more human than she.

Aerith approached Tifa with a bag packed with nonperishable food and changes of clothing. She came close enough to whisper. "Can't you say anything to her, Tifa? Anything?"

Yuffie brushed past them and glared at Aerith.

"She's stubborn and her mind's made up," Tifa said.

In the road, Cloud idled by the Shinra buggy. He glanced in Tifa's direction. His face was blank in the way it was always blank when his heart overflowed with feelings. When he was overwhelmed, he shut down. It was the thing Tifa hated the most about him.

He had been overwhelmed for the better part of two years.

Vincent stood and paced. His eyes locked with Aerith. Their interactions were always strange, but their nonverbal communication was increasingly difficult to interpret.

Yuffie slung her pack over the motorcycle: a cheap, old one; one that had belonged to the Leon family, Tifa recalled. It was remarkably unscathed. Yuffie had spent the better part of the day finding fuel and a replacement battery. "This is your last chance to come to Wutai where you'll be safe and your asses aren't gonna get killed," Yuffie cried. "About half a day southwest of here, there's a dock. I can get us all on. No questions asked." She nodded to Vincent. "Except maybe him."

"I wish I could, Yuffie," Aerith said. "Really I do. If only you could understand how…"

"Uh huh. Yeah." Yuffie strapped her duffelbag to the motorcycle and hopped on. She revved the engine. Without another word, she peeled off down the ruined road out of town.

Tifa frowned. After years, she and Yuffie had never bonded the way she and Aerith had within weeks. "Do you think we'll ever see her again?" Tifa asked.

Aerith tried to smile. "I was about to ask you."

Tifa nodded.

"You could have gone," Aerith said. "I believe her when she said you could be safe. She really believed it herself."

Tifa watched Cloud and Vincent fidget. "Maybe she's right and we're going to die soon. We'd probably deserve it."

"Tifa…"

"But that doesn't matter. I'm not running and hiding anymore." Tifa looked and saw her own resolve reflected in Aerith's eyes.

Vincent cleared his throat. "We should go. The monsters in this area are vicious and they're worse by night."

Tifa stoof and pulled Aerith up with her. Cait Sith hopped into Tifa's arms. Cloud crawled into the buggy and Vincent followed.

Tifa cast a final look over her shoulder as she entered the buggy, trying to match the ruined streets with those of her memory: ghostly apparitions that seemed more fantasy than real after only two years. She tried to remember the day _he_ came back. She tried to remember Zack Fair and Sephiroth when he was only half-way a monster. She tried to remember Hojo: the monster next door.

The memories stung like lemon juice on a hundred papercuts as rain began to drizzle, drowning out the distant banshee wail of Yuffie's motorcycle.

"It's horrible, isn't it?" Cait Sith asked at last.

The buggy began to move. Tifa shut the hatch and tried to leave behind the spectral images of her past. Instead, she only remembered deeper…

* * *

_A/N: At about 60,000 words now. Wow. Thanks for the reviews, those of you who have reviewed! The next update may not be on my usual schedule. I'm revisiting a prior fic for Halloween and that will be my priority in October. Trust me on this one. ^_^_


	15. Chapter 15: Fragments of Memory

**15**

**Fragments of Memory**

"What?" Cloud said.

Zack Fair spoke louder to be heard over the Shinra chopper's pounding blades. "What's in Nibelheim anyhow?"

"You think _I_ know?"

"Hey, hey, no reason to get testy. I figured you'd know. You're from there, aren't you?"

"Yeah. I haven't been back in years though. There were always archeologists in and out of the mountains. Other than that… there's nothing. That's part of why I left."

"What was the other part?"

Cloud closed his mouth tightly.

Zack laughed. "You don't talk much, Cloud, but I can read you like a book. What is it? You get into some kinda trouble?"

"No. Nothing like that."

"Was there… I don't know… Something better in Midgar?"

Cloud stammered for the right words. "It's just that I always wanted to be a SOLDIER. That's all."

"There's a girl, isn't there?"

Cloud scratched his head.

Zack laughed. "Hey, Sephiroth, you know Professor Hojo really well?"

He sat opposite them, gazing out the chopper window—out across the vast hills and mountains below. To them, he was neither friend nor nemesis—simply Sephiroth; more than most, uniquely himself. He did not turn or otherwise acknowledge Zack before he spoke in a voice bereft of emotion. "I have met him on occasion."

Zack "hmm'ed." "You'd think I'd have seen him around more often. He's head of Science Research after all."

"He has lived in Nibelheim nearly year-round of late," Sephiroth said.

Zack glanced at Cloud.

"I've seen him," Cloud said. "I've spoken with him. Not really because I wanted to. He lived nearby. He was weird. My mother wouldn't let me be near him alone."

Sephiroth glanced over. Did he half-way smile? Zack thought it was probably just gas.

Zack did not seem eager to let the topic die. As they approached Mt. Nibel, he pulsed with restless energy. A burg of lumber and stone appeared at the foothills below seeming miniature.

Zack caught the look in Cloud's eye as took in his old home town and smiled. When he had joined SOLDIER, Zack had always wanted an exciting life; an exciting job. He wanted the toils and troubles of Gongaga to seem no bigger than his thumb. Cloud was so much like him in so many ways. They were two men who had chased their dreams and caught them.

"Looks different from up here, doesn't it?" Zack said.

Cloud smiled.

"You think we'll see this girl of yours?"

"I know we will."

Zack's eyes lit up. "Will you have to fight me off with a stick?"

Cloud leaned in almost nose-to-nose with Zack. "If I do, I'm going to find this 'Aerith' of yours and tell her everything."

Zack blinked. "Everything?"

"Even the girl with glasses before you left Gongaga."

Zack pouted.

Sephiroth laughed. "Kids."

Zack ignored them. It was almost time to land and life was good.

Those were Zack's thoughts two weeks before his death.

* * *

Tifa stayed back as the helicopter landed on the outskirts of town. Vivi, or Vinnie, or Vince, or whatever his name his name was chirping in her ear. She did not interact with him much since moving to the mountains with Zangan, but he had an obvious crush on her. He lived in Johnny's old home. It must have been a curse on the house itself. She was scarcely aware of his presence.

She knew in her heart _he_ would call to her when he disembarked. He had contacted her after all. She also knew that her father was first in line to meet the Shinra delegation. She had not spoken to him in two days and did not want to start now. Their arguments had so often revolved around _him_. Cloud had always been her greatest weakness. None of her other friends in Nibelheim had understood that. It was another reason why living in the mountains with a hermit had been alluring.

She had never seen anything like the big, loud contraption. Such things were common in Midgar and other places to the East, but the helicopters that ventured to Nibelheim were of the smaller, less fortified sort. Nibelheim lacked a proper helipad. As the helicopter powered down, the infantrymen walked down the ramp into the dusty air first. They formed an aisle, parting the crowd of brave, too-close onlookers. She did not see him at first, but rather a tall, silver-haired man in black. His narrowed eyes scanned the crowd and then he descended. She had never before seen a man so big and muscular walk with such a pronounced, feline slink. His eyes lingered on her for a moment. Such a powerful, fearful gaze. His eyes seemed drawn to her, but then her father approached him with an outstreached hand. He turned; startled or offended.

"General Sephiroth," the mayor said, "On behalf of Nibelheim, we welcome you and sincerely hope you enjoy your stay."

General Sephiroth seemed reluctant to accept his hand, eyeing it with strange suspicion. He glanced over his shoulder at another SOLDIER waiting just inside the chopper who grinned at him like an idiot. Sephiroth shook the mayor's hand.

If Tifa's father had wanted to impress the SOLDIER with their humble 'burg, he failed. Fortunately, neither he nor most of the others seemed to detect this. Her father continued to vigorously shake the hand long after the SOLDIER wanted to withdraw it.

In the midst of the over-enthusiastic greeting, Tifa caught _him_ out of the corner of her eyes. He emerged from around the corner of the chopper and her heart nearly stopped. He was more muscular and donned the jumpsuit and light plate mail of a SOLDIER. His eyes scanned the crowd too, but Tifa knew he was looking for someone in particular. His eyes met hers for a fraction of a second. A slight smile formed on his lips. Then he looked away without so much as a nod or a wave.

_What?_

Professor Hojo materialized from the crowd. "General Sephiroth," he said. "It's so good to meet you again…"

Sephiroth gazed upon Professor Hojo with a long, measured look and responded only after a moment. What he said, Tifa did not hear. She was no longer listening. She was no longer listening to Vivi; no longer listening to the murmering of Hojo and Sephiroth; no longer waiting for a sidelong glance from Cloud. She had waited for the moment for years and it slipped away like sand through her fingers.

The infantrymen and SOLDIERs left for Professor Hojo's mansion even as Tifa's father invited them to a reception that evening. Cloud trailed along without a backwards glance. Bystanders followed the entourage.

Vivi left and Tifa stood alone.

* * *

Tifa did not have many formal outfits. This one was a shade too tight and consequently Zack Fair would not stop glancing down at her breasts. He was the most affable of the Shinra delegation. He mingled with the citizenry while the infantrymen drank cheap sparkling wine in a corner by themselves, Professor Hojo watched from a corner, and General Sephiroth stood alone. Tifa found Zack friendly and down-to-earth, but he brought up the fact that he had a girlfriend a conspicuous number of times. He perked up immediately when she told him she knew Cloud and then would not stop talking.

Cloud himself had been missing for most of the evening. When he finally appeared, he was dressed in a black and blue suit. He strode across the old Nibelheim theater's promenade. He seemed to be making his way towards her. Suddenly, the lights dimmed three times. He was swept into the cavernous auditorioum by a crowd of people. Zack politely excused himself.

Tifa looked away. Her father approached her. The bowtie on his finely-pressed formal suit was uneven. He clutched a half-empty snifter and watched her with glassy eyes.

Tifa slipped away as quickly as she could. She had no desire for whatever conversation would await them that night.

She had no way of knowing she would never see him again.

* * *

The theater was small by the standards of any large city. It was constructed during Nibelheim's heyday over a century before when the lure of mineral wealth brought immigrants from across Gaia. Bright red tapestries covered over flaking brown and gold paint. A single chandelier illuminated aisles of old ecclesiastic pews lined symmetrically before the stage. The orchestra pit only fit a chamber ensemble. Their tired instruments creaked and hawed through the play's overture.

The SOLDIERs sat on a balcony. Tifa could clearly see them. When she glanced in their direction, Cloud looked away. So did she. She knew her father was on the opposite balcony. Unsure of where to look, she was left only with the option of watching the show. It was a newer production: all the rage in Midgar from what she had heard. Her father wanted to appear worldly.

The curtains opened. Boards painted to resemble clouds hung from the rafters. A bright sun mural took center stage. The overture reached a crescendo and then dulled to a measured adagio. A white-clad chorus emerged from the left and right wings. They began to chant in unison:

"_When the war of the beasts brings about the world's end,_

_ The goddess descends from the sky._

_ Wings of light and dark spread afar._

_ She guides us to bliss, her gift everlasting._"

Tifa heard a rustling to her right and looked to the balcony. General Sephiroth tensed and stood; brushed past the curtain to the promenade.

Cloud watched him with surprise. Then his eyes turned downward and met Tifa's. This time, he would not look away.

The first act of Loveless began before they could look away from each other. Then, Tifa looked away only so sge could find the aisle and not step on anyone. She no longer cared about the play—she would never again see it, with or without Cloud. None of that mattered. She had never cared more for him. She had never cared more for anyone as she cantered past the curtain into the promenade, stumbling over the soles of her pumps.

He descended the stairs from the balcony. She wiped the beginnings of a tear from her eye knowing it smudged her mascara. His eyes darted across her face and his rush to her descelerated; a smug smile flashed across his lips. "Tifa…"

Tifa smiled despite a surreal absence of happiness. "I wanted to see you, Cloud."

The lack of warmth in his eyes startled her. "And I missed you."

"How's Midgar?"

"Different. Nothing like Nibelheim at all. I mean that in a good way."

It somehow registered as a slight. "You finally did it, Cloud."

He tilted his head, still smiling. "I did it?"

"You made it into SOLDIER."

Cloud shrugged. "I made it this far."

"Well… it was your dream. How has it been?"

"Busy. There are a lot of responsibilities. I have come a long way towards my dream. I made it this far, but I'm only a Third Class. That's nothing really. Barely a recruit. Zack and Sephiroth are both First Class."

"Well obviously that must count for something. After all, they sent you out here, didn't they?"

"Well… because I had an 'in.' It made sense."

Tifa's face darkened. Cloud realized he had said something horribly wrong too late. "So now I'm an 'in,' huh?"

"I heard you were a really reliable guide these days." It was too late. The damage had been done.

Tifa glowered. Words caught in her throat. Now she was all business. "So where are we going tomorrow?"

"I can't talk about it a lot. It's classified."

"Ah."

"Hey Cloud, they're getting to the good part," Zack cried from the balcony. "You and Tifa can catch up tomorrow."

Cloud turned to Tifa. "Want to sit with us in the balcony?"

Tifa shook her head. "No."

A long pause.

"_Cloud,_" Zack called down again.

Cloud barked back, "Give me a minute." He turned to her to confirm she would not follow and then returned to the auditorium, dejected.

Tifa watched him disappear behind the theater's curtain. She poured herself a glass of wine, alone. It was produced in Nibelheim more than a decade before back when vintners promised to revive the local economy. It was far too ambitious a task. Even her father, the mayor, somehow knew Nibelheim was beyond revival. Tifa leaned against a decaying, wood panel wall and promised herself she would not cry. "Idiot…"

She failed to look ahead: a problem that had plagued her throughout her life. She did not see the stranger approach: only heard the slap of his palms against the wall to the right and left of her face. He stood three heads above her, but leaned down: his silver hair teasing her face. He had the most striking green eyes she had ever seen; that she would see for two more years to come.

His voice was deep and silky and it made Tifa acutely aware of her aloneness. "Foolish boy. What a sin not to pluck a flower of such immaculate beauty. If he will not, then perhaps I should."

Tifa swallowed. "I'll scream."

"That _would_ make things more entertaining."

Her posture and spirit could not match the confidence of her words, but she was undeniably afraid. "I'm the famous warrior monk Zangan's protégé. I could kill you with my bare hands."

His voice seemed to deepen. "I'm a SOLDIER First Class. No, you couldn't."

She swallowed. "I could cripple you or make it so you can never have children."

Those stark green eyes flashed with amusement. He withdrew his hands and stepped away from her—to a comfortable distance. "You're far too serious Miss Lockhart."

Tifa stood upright and glowered. "How do you know who I am?"

"Zack's puppy dog told me the name of our guide. He had a certain light in his eyes. You should see the play together with him."

"Why aren't you watching it?"

The amusement rushed from his face. "I dislike the theater."

"Oh yeah?"

He turned away. "I dislike mankind's simulacra. Drama. Art. Architecture. Music. Poetry."

Tifa had calmed, but still still stood on alert. "Why's that?"

"They say it is inspired by life, but they love their creation more than its inspiration. They have created false idols of neon and chrome and forsaken the greater gods of Gaia in their midst."

"Hm. You seem to have the heart of a poet yourself."

Sephiroth glared at her, but then the amusement returned. "Do I now?"

Tifa averted her eyes.

General Sephiroth's eyes narrowed. "You plan on lingering here?"

Tifa shrugged, aware of fresh tears.

He sighed and turned towards the double-door to the cool night. "I suppose I shall see you tomorrow then, Miss Lockhart. I feel this promenade is too small for both of our troubles."

Tifa frowned. "My father put a lot of thought into this evening. It meant a lot to him to honor Shinra's SOLDIERs."

He spun in a flash. Green eyes scoured her soul. "So you are that concerned about your father's pandering suddenly?"

Tifa retreated a step, startled; pressured by his gaze.

General Sephiroth's eyes softened. "No. There is no honor in being a SOLDIER. To be a SOLDIER is to become a slave to the powerful." He turned to leave, but hesitated. "If you truly love that boy, you should sever all ties with him once he leaves."

Tifa blushed. "What?"

"He will never be able to return your feelings and you could never love what he might someday become."

Sephiroth departed with a flourish of his long, black coattails.

Tifa lingered in solitude.

* * *

They met at the base of Mount Nibel, just outside of town: the SOLDIERs, a few archaologists she had met, a few other Shinra types, and a dozen infantrymen. Tifa, Cloud, and Sephiroth acted as though no awkward exchanges had occurred the night before. If Zack picked up on this, bless his heart, he did not show it.

Professor Hojo was first to approach Tifa. He tried not to leer at her. She had contemplated a more conservative outfit, but then asked herself, why should she treat this expedition as different from any other?

Oh, right.

After initial pleasantries, they began the long hike up the mountain trail. Tifa both longed for and dreaded private time with Cloud. They still had barely spoken with each other since his return, but General Sephiroth's words lingered in her mind.

The trail banked. General Sephiroth, at the lead of the Shinra entourage, began further along the trail. Tifa stopped him. He shot her a quizzical look.

"We go this way," she said, and pointed towards a rocky terrace.

"Is that way a dead end?" General Sephiroth asked.

"No," Tifa said. "But it's more hazardous. Monsters."

General Sephiroth followed her. "I have read that monster attacks are common in this area."

The leader of the infantrymen whose name Tifa was never able to remember—Bidge or something of the sort—spoke up. "Monsters?"

Tifa hoisted herself up a ledge by a tree limb. The infantrymen and Professor Hojo would have trouble at that step, but they would much prefer the awkward footing to what could lay in wait for them up the trail. "You read right, General." She turned to the infantryman. "Monsters: powerful animals that will viciously attack humans on sight. They're much rarer to the East."

"Why are they so dangerous?" The officer said.

Professor Hojo nearly stumbled off the rock ledge. Zack caught him with one hand and hoisted him to his feet. "Perhaps they feel as though mankind deserves it," the professor said.

General Sephiroth slowed. As Professor Hojo passed him, he watched him with the same piercing eyes he had watched Tifa the night before. They were eyes that seemed to tear past layers of one's soul.

They had to stop after an hour for the infantrymen to rest. Tifa did not say more than a word or two for the rest of the hike. When they approached the summit, Tifa stopped at the sign marked, "_Shinra personnel only beyond this point._" It was always as far as she escorted the usual archaologists.

Professor Hojo leered, passing her. "Why stop there, Miss Lockhart?"

"Well…" Tifa said, "I thought…"

"Soon the whole world will know our discovery. Besides. It simply would not be a party without you." When she did not follow, he cackled.

General Sephiroth glanced back and forth between them both and whispered to Zack. Tifa followed to the crags of the cave's gaping mouth and would go no further, despite the Professor's urgings. She remembered the old fears instilled upon her as a child by her father: that Professor Hojo had the aura of a child-snatcher, or worse. She waited with the infantrymen.

* * *

"No matter what you do," Sephiroth whispered, "do not let Professor Hojo out of your sight. He is not to be trusted."

Zack did not like seeing the most feared and revered of all SOLDIERs anxious. Professor Hojo glanced over his shoulder as though having overheard. A slow chortling noise filled the air—or was it the whistling wind through the musty limestone? Cloud glanced at Zack, detecting a change in his gait or posture.

Zack forced himself to crack a smile.

Cloud walked on, unperterbed. He knew something was the matter. Just the same, his trust in Zack was such that if Zack did not want to make a big deal of it, he would not himself. Maybe that would be to his detriment someday. Cloud was young and naïve. He had yet to experience the pain of war or the betrayal of a comrade.

Zack should have been far more jaded than he was. As it was, he followed Professor Hojo deeper into the cave until the glimmer of their flashlights reflected jagged new metal on the stone walls and something more. Professor Hojo flipped a switch and newly-installed lights faded on with a faint electrical hum. It was then Zack realized they were not in a cave. They were in a laboratory.

It was a very old laboratory. Ancient even. As light slowly filled the room, his flashlight glanced across the surface of a dusty metal sign: written in some unidentifiable language. It did not look Wutainese, nor was it native to the Western continents. To Zack it looked, for lack of a better word, alien.

Cloud, of all people, spoke first. "Where the hell are we?"

The room was almost visible for the Shinra-installed lighting fixtures when Cloud's light flashed across a jagged cell of glimmering glass: the light refracting through its coarse façade.

Through the façade, a pristine silver face frowned.

It was just a statue. Or a mask. Something unreal. Something that could never be real.

Sephiroth's voice was short and snappy. "Where are we, Professor Hojo?"

"We've discovered something of incomparable value, General Sephiroth," Professor Hojo said. "Something that guarantees Wutai will never be a threat again. Go ahead…" He pointed to the encapsulated thing. "Have a look for yourself."

Zack saw distrust and defiance in Sephiroth's eyes. He would wonder for the remainder of his brief life whether or not Sephiroth knew what would happen when he approached it; when he ascended the stairs to its display; when he reached forward to brush a layer of dust away from the glass; when the thing snapped to life and wailed like a banshee fleeing the deepest, darkest pits of hell.

General Sephiroth jumped away, but he did not look surprised.

Its body quivered and then stilled. Red jewels recessed within the silver face flashed left and right before focusing on Sephiroth. Its hands raised and slammed against the glass, pounding and pounding. With each pound, the glass cracked deeper and longer.

The infantrymen raised their guns.

Sephiroth drew the Masamune. "Hold your fire."

Zack drew his Buster Sword and saw the startled look in Cloud's eyes. "Cloud," he snapped.

Cloud shook away the dawning of panic and drew his broadsword.

The glass shattered. The creature tore at wire teathering and unbound itself.

"Professor Hojo, what is going on?" Sephiroth said.

He did not respond, but strode towards the thing with a slow, confident gait. "There you are, my pretty."

"Professor Hojo?" Zack said.

The creature titled its head and accelerated towards Hojo.

Zack grabbed Professor Hojo by the waist and flung him across his shoulder, writhing and protesting. "Dumbass."

"Get him out of here," Sephiroth barked.

The creature raced after Zack with inhuman speed and a pronounced feline swagger. Zack stumbled. When he released Professor Hojo, the scientist fell hard and banged his head against a rock.

Sephirth shouted at the stunned infantrymen. "Open fire."

The infantrymen shook off their own surprise and fired from the hip with abandon. The creature writhed, stumbled, and finally fell in a heap of vermillion blood and bullets. Silence and gunsmoke filled the room for almost a minute.

Its head flicked upright; the silver face crumbled to reveal azul skin and an eye that glowed like sunfire.

The Shinra troopers fired again, but their bullets ricocheted off a transluscent field in front of the creature. It rose to its feet. With a flick of its wrist—a pale, waterlogged chunk of damaged flesh—the Shinra infantrymen vanished in a flash of bright, iridescent green, weaving to and fro, in and out of the cavern walls.

It turned to the SOLDIERs. Zack shook off his fall with Professor Hojo beside him, nearly unconscious. He did not need to read minds to sense the abject panic in Cloud Strife's heart.

The creature reacted with what seemed like surprise when Sephiroth lunged into it, impaling it with his blade.

It began to crumble and shift. A green appendage resembling a tentacle lanced out from the mass of splinted silver metal and watery, inhuman flesh. The pointed tip of the appendage pierced Sephiroth's muscle and bone. A second followed. He stood stunned; impaled; pain and ichor coursing through his body. He collapsed to the ground. The creature disengaged and regarded him with a look of disdain or satisfaction: whether both or neither, none present could tell.

It turned its glowing eyes to Cloud. The mask having fallen away, atop a mangled, asymmetrical mass of blood, it had a remarkably human face. Feminine. Almost beautiful.

Then its mouth widened to half its face and it shrieked.

Cloud stumbled back and cowered as the creature scrambled across the floor on feet, hands, and mystery appendages.

Zack cried out and stood, but it was too late.

As it reached to attack, it disintegrated in a flury of blood. Sephiroth had raced—nearly flew—across the span of the cavern and unleashed a flurry of slashes with the Masamune.

Silence returned to the cavern. Only the sound of squirting vital fluids from the twitching creature filled the cavern. The stench of blood and entrails from humans as well as the creature pricked Cloud's nose and he vomited.

Zack blanched. "What the fuck…?"

"I'm sorry… I'm so sorry, Sephiroth…" Cloud whispered at last. Then he looked up. His commanding officer fell to his knees and screamed out in silence, clutching his head. Zack felt a ringing like a bell through his own. They all writhed in silent pain.

Then the SOLDIER with green eyes and hair of silver turned to them. But from some wild gleam in his eyes, they both knew he was not Sephiroth. Not anymore.

* * *

The gunfire from inside the cavern should have been Tifa's first cue to run and never look back. It silenced and then the more terrible noises started. The infantrymen all around fidgeted nervously. Tifa thought of running, but remembered all of the things she needed to tell Cloud.

She ran headlong into the cavern. What felt like hours, but could only have been minutes passed. The smell made her nauseas and the sight made her heart freeze for only a minute. Cloud was prone on the ground before the damaged remains of something the likes of which her most terrible nightmare could not have fathomed. He was facing General Sephiroth, crouched over the still-writhing thing, his back to her.

"Cloud," Tifa cried. She ran to him, panting frantic.

When he saw her approach, a new wave of panic touched Cloud. "Tifa, no…"

General Sephiroth spun on his heels. The long, vicious blade at his side flashed across her chest and as the steel tore fabric and flesh, she saw eyes of inhuman green, feline slits.

The pain came later. At first there was only a jarring shock to her system. That was how she knew it was bad. She tumbled to the ground and when she fell, he was on top of her, grinning like a madman, ripping at her clothes. She flailed and punched. He would not budge—grinning.

He stopped. He turned. Cloud's broadsword swung out. Sephiroth parried it neatly, eye to eye with Cloud. Cloud's glare could have cut stone. Sephiroth smirked and pushed hard from the waist. Their blades disengaged. Cloud spun away and slammed back-first into a wall.

Footsteps echoed through the tunnel entrance. Sephiroth waved his hand. Rocks fell from above as the footsoldiers entered the cavern, missing them, but leaving them stunned.

"That's not General Sephiroth," Zack barked. "Shoot him!"

One look into Sephiroth's eyes convinced them well enough. They fired out of fear.

Tifa lay panting on the ground, stunned; feeling the numbing onset of shock. Professor Hojo watched her from his corner, regaining consciousness. Cloud squirmed away. It was not supposed to happen this way. Cloud's return was supposed to mark a turning point in her life. It was meant to reaffirm who and what she was. It was meant to quiet growing, rebellions feeling from within her heart.

Instead, she lay prone and bleeding in a cave. A strong, masculine form appeared by her side. He was broad-shouldered and handsome, but he was not Cloud. Zack hoisted her over his shoulder and as General Sephiroth rushed out the cavern entrance leaving dead Shinra personell in his wake, it was he who ferried her to safety.

Cloud looked on, startled and ashamed. Through clouds of debris, he followed in Sephiroth's wake. The cave walls crumbled and shook. Hojo stirred from against the wall, watching them all with wide eyes. They turned away and never looked back.

The flare of sunlight stung their eyes, searing pain into the back of their brains. New sounds approached. Sephiroth flew—really flew past rows of infantrymen. A helicopter gunship approached from beyond a mountain ridge. A missile fired. Sephiroth raised a hand and the missile spiraled out of control, colliding into a bare mountain face. A translucent field like the one conjured by the creature shielded him from a barrage of machine gun fire. He sliced with his sword and wave of iridescent light slaced the gunship in half.

Other aircraft approached fast.

Zack panted. "We've got to run."

"What's going on?" Tifa asked.

Zack would not answer, but ran as quickly as he could along the cliff edge by the cavern. The aircraft grew louder. Explosions flared above. High above Nibelheim, a single human-sized point of dark hovered. Aircraft exploded for many minutes until finally the noises stopped.

That was when Tifa heard the whistling. She had never before heard artillery fire, but through unfocused eyes, saw its affects. Mount Nibel itself shook. After only a minute, an explosion pounded the skyborn figure and General Sephiroth vanished from view. Only the shelling continued. Explosions shattered the old opera house; the mayor, her father's home; her eighty-three year-old neighbor's home; Zangan's hut on the far mountain ridge.

Nibelheim vanished in fire and smoke.

Zack settled her against the cave wall, appraising her. He was half-covered in blood now—her blood. "Shit. The wound's deeper than I thought. We need to bandage this up right now. Give me some fabric Cloud. Cloud!"

Cloud blinked away a tear, his eyes also fixated on the chaos. He complied.

Zack wrapped Tifa's wound. "Stay with me, girlfriend." He followed her gaze into the fire and bit his lower lip. "Stop looking, Tifa. Stop looking."

* * *

She had not been able to stop looking. Driving away from the ruins of Nibelheim, she still saw fire and destruction though those fires had been cool for years. Neither Cloud nor Vincent, nor Aerith, nor Cait Sith spoke. They had their own thoughts to be lost in.

Tifa's gut twisted in sharp, cramping pain. She could think of nothing but blood and death death. Nibelheim died that day. It had been dying a slow death by natural causes, but Shinra executed it. Nearly every one of her friends and all of her family died. What was more, a piece of herself had changed that day. She had lost her last spark of innocence and allowed herself to lose her humanity in bits and pieces, leaving a cold-blooded monster prowling the nights. She had never before given so much thought to some kind of salvation, but in that moment found it hopelessly out of reach.

In her mind's reflection of that dark day long ago in Nibelheim, Tifa could see her own death.

That death would come soon.

* * *

_A/N: Sorry for the posting delay and I appreciate the reviews! I have, in fact been pecking away at this chapter for the better part of two months. I wanted to prioritize the Dark Fantasy Omake in October and then I had to resolve a few minor continuity glitches in this_._ Hopefully I'll be back to my roughly once a month schedule soon._


	16. Chapter 16: SOLDIER

**16**

**SOLDIER**

Cloud stopped the transport after a day's drive. Tifa realized that on foot through this rugged terrain, it was about a week's journey. Aerith and Cait Sith questioned why they stopped. Vincent and Hojo never seemed to question much of anything, rather spending most of their waking hours staring each other down. Hojo punctuated their staring contests with apparently random smirks and chuckles. It was disconcerting.

When she heard the waterfall's crashing roar, Tifa knew exactly where they were. The lake spanned almost as far as her eyes could see to the east and south. She followed Cloud out of the vehicle in spite of Aerith's gentle protests.

It looked the same as it did two years before. At least as well as Tifa could remember, it did. She was unconscious upon her approach and only glimpsed it as they left when she was healed enough to walk. How many waterfalls of that size could there be a day out from Mount Nibel anyhow?

Cloud knew exactly where to find the cave entrance. Aerith still called into her ear, demanding to know where they were going. Tifa could barely hear her for the wailing water.

Inside of the cavern was eerie silence if not for the echo of their footsteps against limestone and jutting, dramatic quartz. The cavern was all but invisible and soundproof: it was the perfect place to hide from a near-omniscient foe. No one in the world would ever find a man in hiding here.

Unless he willfully surrendered this secret hiding place. Even trusting Tifa, Cloud, and Zack, it would have been unwise to remain there after their encounter. They had inadvertently ruined perhaps the world's greatest hideout.

Its inhabitant was long gone and had left no trace.

"What is this place?" Aerith asked.

"We passed by here years ago," Tifa said. "After I was injured in Nibelheim. Someone… Someone found us and took us in. He helped nurse me back to health. If not for him, I'm sure I would have died before we made it half-way to Costa Del Sol."

"Who was he?" Aerith said.

"A SOLDIER," Cloud said. "He was one of the first. He trained Zack a long time ago. We found him hiding from Shinra here."

Cait Sith clutched Tifa's leg. "Why was Shinra looking for him?"

Cloud glowered at the mechanical puppet. "He went AWOL years ago. SOLDIERs have retired before, but Shinra likes to keep tabs on them."

"This one didn't want Shinra to keep tabs on him?" Aerith said.

"No." Cloud offered a rare half-smile. "I figured he would be gone, but I thought we should at least try. We're running out of friends."

Cait Sith disengaged from Tifa. "I think I know who you're talking about. There aren't many SOLDIERs who have gone missing. But why? No one in Shinra ever figured it out for sure. Why did he run away?"

Cloud's eyes narrowed. "Why?"

* * *

The former President Shirna was a man of Falstaffian appetites. Food, wine, women: there were no limits to his hunger. Rumors among Midgar's elite circulated that he had half a dozen bastard children. Not that SOLDIER First Class Jecht ever associated with Midgar's elite. He heard it from much lower down the grapevine. Jecht had seen President Shinra drunk, however, and he found the rumors quite plausible. After four drinks, the hot-temptered but stern man became a raving adolescent—an uninhibited, lecherous slob.

Rufus Shinra was not his father. Nor was he like Jecht himself who craved a drink desperately—needed it now to banish bad memories and regrets. Though he was on his second snifter of brandy, liquor did not suit Rufus Shinra well. Alcohol made some see the world through a ruby-hued haze, but for others, it lifted some fog of self-deceit and made them see the world exactly as it was, which was truly terrifying. Judging from his deceptively sober expression, Rufus was the latter and maybe Jecht was more like the former President Shinra than he wanted to believe.

Under the cover of dusk, Rufus glanced up from the security map. He had not really been reading it. He seemed to read Jecht's mind, however. "Would you care for a drink, SOLDIER?"

"Shouldn't sir. I'm on duty."

Rufus Shinra flashed a guileful smile and swished his snifter.

Jecht's willpower caved in all at once. "Maybe just one…"

Rufus certainly smiled with more charm and charisma than his father. His father never looked right smiling. He retrieved a second snifter and poured brandy to just past its widest point.

Jecht took a sip. It was not whisky, but it would suffice. "Thanks, sir."

"Anytime. We'll be working together closely. I like to get to know the men with whom I'll be working closely."

Jecht shot him a puzzled look.

Rufus smirked. "I'm told it can increase one's… life expectancy."

Jecht looked away and took another sip. "You don't trust me?"

"It's nothing about you in particular. My father always told me never to trust anyone. Especially anyone working for him. Almost ironic."

Jecht's eyebrows furrowed and he took another sip. "Sir?"

"It was his most prized SOLDIER that killed him."

"Ah."

"Did you know him well?"

"Everyone knew General Sephiroth. But yeah, we fought together pretty close in the Wutai uprising. He was a cold son of a bitch."

Rufus quirked an eyebrow.

"Don't get me wrong," Jecht said. "It wasn't like he was the meanest or hardest one. Compared to some he kept his nose pretty clean. It was just what he did do, he did without any feeling at all. Some of us had a good time doing what we did. Some had a problem with it. Like Angeal, not that it ever really stopped him. Sephiroth just didn't give a shit one way or the other. It was freaky."

Rufus' eyes were inquisitive; inviting. "Really."

Jecht took another sip to dam the flood of memories, but knew it was too late. "The shit we did. Torturing civilians. Killing kids. When the conventional war ended, they were all guerrillas. Even the kids had guns. We did what we had to do." His eyes narrowed to a scowl. "We did what Shinra wanted us to do."

Rufus Shinra was completely unreadable. "Is that so?"

Jecht drank more. Rufus topped him off. "I guess I can't blame him too much. It's not like anyone even told us to do most of it. No one put a gun to my head and told me to kill an eighty-year-old grandmother. Your father… your father rewarded cruelty. He favored the most ruthless of us. Only when Sephiroth and his men razed Fort Tamblin and killed every man, woman, and child in it, was it a direct order."

"Did General Sephiroth want to do that?" Rufus asked.

Jecht shrugged. "Who the fuck knows? If he did, he didn't say nothing about it. But I had to wonder if he resented it. A lot of people didn't like your father. A lot of them really, really didn't."

Rufus shrugged too. "I didn't even like my father."

Jecht paused mid-sip.

Rufus met his eyes with a wry smile. "I know. Look at me now. I guess no matter how we fight it, we all become our fathers someday."

Jecht nodded.

Rufus Shinra was either gentler than people made him out to be or far more cunning.

* * *

It was two years ago. Tifa spent the better part of a week drifting in and out of consciousness. She remembered Cloud's quiet concern and Zack's flirtacious, distracting concern. The pain; the wheezing and clicking of her own breathing; the hellish moments of alertness that reminded her it was terribly, horribly real: that was her first week after Nibelheim.

The roar of the waterfall was the first loud noise she'd heard all day. Zack cooked a trio of fishes over an open fire.

"We should make a bigger fire," Cloud said their evening out. "Maybe someone will find us."

Zack cast Tifa a long, thoughtful look before he spoke. "I don't think we want to be found."

"But Tifa…?" Cloud began.

"…Might not stand a chance either way," Zack finished.

Tifa had been in too much agony to form an opinion one way or the other.

On that particular evening, about a week out, as they sat by the roaring waterfall, Zack came to attention midway through eating his fish: a little sunfish that spoke to his lack of skill as a fisherman. They did not see the man approach, but when they turned, a blade longer than Zack's Buster Sword pointed to the back of his neck.

"There was smoke in Nibelheim," a low, dark voice growled. "Did you do that, SOLDIERs?" The silhouted figure was a slight bit taller than Zack and had similarly spiky black hair. In hindsight, he reminded Tifa of the strong, seasoned man Zack could have been, but would never be able to become.

"Shinra did it, Angeal," Zack said, wavering fear in his voice. "We've been on the run since then."

Angeal Hewley lowered his sword. "I didn't take you for a murderer, Zack. It's been many years and time with Public Safety can change a man."

Zack turned and took in his face for the first time since his arrival. "What are you doing here?"

"I'll ask you first," the old SOLDIER said, but then he really noticed Tifa for the first time. A look of concern and then a look of irritation crossed his face. "What is she doing here? She's a civilian." Now he acknowledged Cloud for the first time. "Both of you get out of here and never come back."

"Please," Cloud shouted.

Angeal glared.

"She was my friend." Even in her wounded stupor, Tifa could not help but register his use of the past tense. "She'll die if we can't let her rest and recover."

Angeal sealed his eyes and inhaled sharply. "Alright. Alright. Follow me."

He started towards the waterfall. Cloud started to pick up Tifa. Her body stiffened and she shrugged him away. Zack arched an eyebrow and tightened his lips. He allowed _him_ to carry her. They followed Angeal until he disappeared behind the crashing waterfall.

A rocky stone passage beneath led to a small tunnel and then a deep, recessed cavern. It was surprisingly bright. The cave's crystalline superstructure seemd to glow with a pale light from within: like the eerie, iridescent glow of materia. Inside, they saw that it was no mere cave, however. It was a home. A lived in home of years with primitive, homemade wooden furniture, a straw and cloth bed, and a hearth near the entrance.

Angeal laid out a mattress of haphazardly-stitched rags. They laid Tifa across it.

"The water absorbs the smoke," Angeael said after what must have been half an hour of changing Tifa's bandages. "You were either too nervous to dress this wound properly, Zack, or you paid less attention than I thought during your survival training."

Zack sulked in a corner, not far from Cloud. "Yeah. I know, alright?"

Angeal smiled an uncomfortable smile at Tifa. "What's your name, young lady?"

Tifa would not look him in the eye.

"He's okay, Tifa," Zack said. "He was my mentor a long time ago."

"Tifa, huh?" Angeal said. He stared at her bloodied, bare chest. "By the Goddess. What did this? This was no animal. Nor was it a Shinra weapon."

Zack swallowed. "It was the Masamune."

Angeal's eyes widened. "What?"

Zack explained their trek to Nibelheim and their ill-fated encounter at Mt. Nibel. Tifa and Angeal listened on, wordless, unable to look at each other.

Angeal sighed at the end of the story. "Sephiroth too?"

Cloud and Zack exchanged a glance and spoke in unison. "Too?"

"Just like Genesis long ago," Angeal said. "He was consumed by a strange darkness and turned on his comrades."

Zack shook his head. "Genesis and all of those SOLDIERs died in a training accident. Right before Deepground came online."

Angeal regarded Zack with calm patience. "Genesis _was_ the training accident, Zack. He was leading a holographic combat simulation when he turned on his own pupil and began to slaughter them. At least that's what we think happened. By the time Sephiroth; the Turk, Tseng; and I got there, no one else was left alive. Just Genesis—still rambling on about that damned play he obsessed over so."

"What happened?" Zack said.

"Sephiroth took his miserable life." He would not look at them. "I couldn't move. And now it looks like Sephiroth too succumbed to whatever took Genesis."

"It can't be the same thing… could it?" Zack said.

Angeal 'hmphed.' "I wonder…"

Zack's eyes narrowed. "So that's why you ran, isn't it? You didn't even think for one minute maybe I wanted to know? Maybe other people needed to know? I haven't seen you in years and this is why?"

"I'm sorry, Zack," Angeal said. "I'm a strong man, but I've never been a brave one. There are a lot of things I've seen. There are things I've _done_ in my life I'm not proud of. I've proven myself best at two things. Running and hiding." He seemed to pre-empt Zack's next thought. "You can't judge me anymore than I've already judged myself."

No one spoke for minutes or hours. Time seemed frozen in an amorphous state. Tifa finally broke her extended silence. "Water."

The three men turned at once.

"Water. Please."

"You can stay for a day or two. No more. I don't need any unwanted attention. But I suppose you're right, Zack. I owe you for my secrecy after all." Angeal stood and fetched a hand-carved bucket. "Do you intend to return to Shinra?"

Zack's face darkened. "No. But I need to get back to Midgar."

Angeal humored him with a smile. "Shinra's headquarters. She must be some girl after all."

Zack tried to smile back, but there was an empiness behind the smile. It was an emptiness that would spread over days and then weeks while Zack sank deeper into bleak, unspoken thoughts.

Tifa slept for the better part of two days straight and woke up at midnight on the third able to move on her own. Sleeping, she had shed her weakness like a snakeskin. What covered her cold-blooded interior now was all hard and impenetrable.

As they prepared to leave the following day, Angeal sent them on their way with expired, but still edible Public Safety rations he had commandeered somehow. None of them wanted to know how. He never asked them for their silence or secrecy—only hollored out to Zack as they left: "Back in Nibelheim… You felt it didn't you?"

Zack half-turned and nodded.

"So did I," Angeal said. "Keep your wits about you and don't let it get you too. Or you, Cloud."

Tifa could only wonder what ever became of Angeael Hewley after he left that mysterious cavern. She only hoped it was not the same thing that had become of Zack.

* * *

Rufus did not speak until he and Jecht exited Shinra Tower into the dark, crowded streets. The tower had ears all around.

"You going to be alright, Mr. President?" Jecht asked, noticing a slight sway to his walk. They had both had too many. Rufus looked burdened. Jecht felt alive again. It was a shame that these days he only truly felt alive before bed.

At least the sharp gleam of Rufus' eyes had not dulled. "My ride's around the corner. Thanks for the company tonight."

Jecht's PHS rang. He glanced at the number, but remained still.

"If that's Scarlet, I'm sure you can call her back," Rufus said.

Jecht's heart nearly skipped a beat.

"I'd imagine even after your transfer to Midgar, she still has you looking over reports. She never wants to let go of a talented worker."

"Right…"

Rufus' PHS rang next. "Hm. Tseng. One of our operatives is arriving in South Corel…" It was a rare loose-lipped moment, by mistake or cunning. "I should call him back. A word though. You're a good man, Jecht. And I daresay you've spent nearly as much time with my family's company as I have. But here's some advice: it's a den of monsters. You've got the monsters you know, the monsters you don't, and the ones who pretend they're not monsters. They're the ones you have to worry about most."

Jecht was silent and remained silent as Rufus' car rounded a corner, picked him up, and drove off into the dank night.

"I'm a SOLDIER," Jecht grumbled to himself, all alone in a sea of faceless thousands. "You think I don't already fucking know that?"


	17. Chapter 17: The Burning Garden

**17**

**The Burning Garden**

Tseng's voice rasped over the phone. "_It's been a week since our last sighting. You're sure they're in that Shinra buggy._" It was not a question.

"Yeah," Reeve said. "It's been making its way from Nibelheim. No mistake. It's them."

"_Remember. If Aerith Gainsborough is with them, you will take her alive._"

"I never made any promises and the president never gave me that stipulation."

"_She's never committed an act of terrorism. She's just a flower girl mixed up with the wrong crowd._"

"Well, far as I'm concerned, that makes her fair game."

"_Well, that was you for years too, remember. Besides. That wasn't a request. It was an order. You are not to harm her._"

"Whatever you say, Tseng. I'll do my best."

"…"

"You there, Tseng?"

"_I am. You're a cold son of a bitch. You know that?_"

"What?"

"_You heard me, Reeve. Answer me this. And this is all off the record. Like you give a damn. You lived with Barret Wallace and his men for three years. You don't feel any empathy at all for them. Do you?_"

"I've lived for nothing but killing them this whole time, Tseng."

"_Right. I can see that now._"

"If they don't make any stops, they'll be here this afternoon. If they keep heading North, they'll take the mountain pass. I'm sure of it. Lieutenant Antilles is in position."

"_Avoid civilian casualties._"

"I know that already, Tseng. Dammit, why are you talking to me like some newbie?"

"_Because the President was wrong. He never should have sent you. I would have never done it._"

"I'll get it done."

"_You'll do something reckless._"

If it was reverse psychology, it almost worked. "Look, Tseng, I know I've got personal feelings. But I'll get it done, and I'll do it by the book."

"_Right._" Tseng hung up.

Reeve peered out his window into the bright bazaar. "The Gateway to the Gold Saucer." That was what the old tourism brouchures said. Then North Corel bit the big one and they had to rebuild the mako reactor at a new site with existing infrastructure. The laborers moved in and the lush steepe-side gardens withered. Dio built a bypass further up the main road. Now few but unemployed vagrants and shady travelers passed through South Corel towards the system of dangerous mountain passes that led to the coast.

South Corel went from a prosperous tourism capitol to the Gold Saucer's trash heap. Nothing grew in the shadow of a mako reactor. Not flowers, not grass, not trees, and not hope. Long ago, Reeve impressed Barret with that bit of knowledge. He told him it was common knowledge within the company, covered up to the outside. That was the truth. Reeve's lie had been that he gave a damn.

Reeve watched the sick and elderly cover their faces with pale, unbleached rags as cover from blustering dust. He wondered for only a moment if this was anything like what Barret's North Corel looked like before the Gods of Progress smote it.

No. It was far too late in the day for Reeve to learn empathy.

Reeve raked his fingers through his dark roots. As his natural color returned, he was much grayer than he had been the last time he wore his own skin. Looking in the mirror, now even more than when he wore his disguise, his reflections did not seem to be his own. He had lied to Tseng. He had changed in his years with AVALANCHE. He could never again be Reeze Tuesti, nor could he be Cid Highwind. He knew if he lived a hundred years, it would be as an uncanny chimera. But he would never live that long. He knew that. He gathered his coat and walked out through the parched, peeled door of his corner motel room convinced somehow he had only hours to decide what it was he had become. He had never believed in a soul, yet wished for his answer as though that nonexistent thing depended on it.

* * *

Aerith glared at Vincent. It was unclear whether her irritation was due to his not answering her question or just the very fact of his presence. "I said, do you think she likes stargazer lilies?"

Vincent in his long red cloak could not have stood out more from the native inhabitants of South Corel in their drab, tattered rags. So did she, in her own way: in her white and pink sleeved dress and bow, a splash of brighter color flittering through the market. Vincent would not have thought they would be conspicuous, but everyone in the crowded market hazarded at least a passing glance at their interplay of light and dark. "I wouldn't have the faintest idea of whether or not she likes stargazer lilies."

"That's too bad. We need to cheer her up somehow."

She was still so young. So innocent. So naïve. "And you think a bunch of flowers will wash away the pain caused by the deaths of all her people?" Vincent said.

To her credit, she looked offended. "Of course not. Dummy. Sometimes it counts for a lot just to show someone you care. I worry about her…"

"It was a big town. I remember it in its heyday. There were too many ghosts for her to battle."

Aerith picked the biggest, most beautiful flowers. "More often than not, ghosts are just figments of peoples' imaginations."

"That makes them all the more deadly."

Aerith frowned. "Do you know what your problem is, Vincent?"

"What, pray tell, is my problem?"

"I'll bet you never take time to stop and smell the flowers." Aerith bought half a dozen stargazer lilies from the vendor: an old woman with silver hair and slit eyes. The woman smiled a toothless smile.

"You can hear the voices of the planet, can you not?" Vincent said. "Can you not sense its suffering in this place?"

"I thought you couldn't," Aerith said.

"I cannot. But I can assume. There is no joy in this place. That I can see. There is no light. Only suffering. I could hardly care about a handful of lilies."

"Well, you're right. There is a lot of suffering here. And I may have taken a little away from that woman. Flowers may well be her only joy. The money helps, but if she's like me, nothing compares to the joy of finding someone as enthralled by them as myself. This place must be like Midgar. You must know nothing grows there. Nine Mako reactors. As far as I know, I had the only flower patch in all of Sector Five."

"It was probably the only flower patch in the whole city."

Aerith cast Vincent a bemused look.

Vincent shrugged. "I've seen the pictures. After the Nibelheim incident, the Turks had the place under constant surveillance. As with your house. With all of the countless hours of documentation, I'd imagine there's scarcely a minute of your life for the past two years Shinra could not account for."

Aerith clutched her arms and shuddered. "That's scary. To think what they could have seen. What they could have done."

"Don't be scared. This may come as a small consolation, but from what I know of Tseng and his plans, he would do you no harm. He is our enemy, but he is fundamentally an honorable man. Moreso than I would be in his shoes."

Aerith quieted. "What happened to you, Vincent? What happened that you can't hear the Lifestream anymore and you don't seem to give a damn for the planet?"

Vincent surveyed the alleys and by-ways of the mud and stone market, trying to detach himself from the conversation. He did not like the way she drew him in. "You wouldn't want to hear and I would rather not tell."

Still, she would not relent. "For someone to be so filled with despair…?"

"Despair is nothing more than the flip-side of a coin called 'hope,' Aerith. Without one there cannot be the other."

"Now you're just trying to blow me off with philosophical nonsense."

Vincent laughed and realized it had been a while since he had really and truly laughed. "And you're more clever than perhaps I credited you for."

Aerith stopped dead in her tracks. He could tell she wanted to turn, but restrained herself.

"What?" Vincent said.

Aerith tensed and then relaxed. She turned and spoke after maybe half a minute. "A familiar presence. Someone's following us. Someone's been following us. But it couldn't be…"

* * *

They could not subsist for a single day more on Shinra rations. The canned pork was unlike any animal protein they had ever had before in an uncanny way. The rice was hard and the unidentifiable grey matter on the side compartments was wretched. They had already cherrypicked through the rations with the unidentifiable pink matter. That tasted almost tolerable.

Tifa took Cait Sith with her to the market to purchase some fresh fruit with some gil they they had pilfered in Nibelheim. The machine was conspicuous, but Tifa promised to conceal him in her shawl. Cloud protested and she ignored him—again. She put too much trust into the lecherous little puppet.

They had decided against stopping near Gonganga and really, that was it for civilization along the poorly-maintained Shinra road. There were scattered outposts and crossroad towns, mostly filled with poachers and traffickers. Cloud had assumed South Corel would be different. It had declined so much just since their last visit two years before. It was all part of the planet's long, slow death march.

After Tifa and Cait Sith left, Aerith and Vincent got up to leave for no apparent reason at all. They were fugitives from the most powerful, far-reaching corporate entity in the world and they wanted to go _shopping_. So now Cloud sat in a stuffy, unventilated motel room painted the brown of manure sitting all alone across from _him_.

Cloud sipped his water. Professor Hojo reclined and chortled as though he had just told himself a great joke. His eyes did not leave Cloud's for longer than it took to blink.

"What's so funny?" Cloud asked.

"We never talk anymore, Cloud. It makes me quite sad."

"You want to talk now?"

"Certainly. Hm. I suspect that young wench of yours with the exquisite breasts will return soon. Can I ask you something now, Cloud?"

Cloud tilted his head.

Hojo leaned in closer, glanced to and fro, and lowered his voice nearly to a whisper as though avoiding the eyes and ears of nonexistent onlookers. "Have you ever had her?"

Cloud clenched his chair. His Buster Sword was arm's length away leaning across the table.

Hojo chortled again. "She's an animal, isn't she? I know the type. It's the shy, quiet ones who will blow your brains out. Is she a screamer?"

Against his own will, Cloud's voice amplified. "What happened after we left Jenova's cave? What did you do?"

"Well, I waited until the fires died down… and then I returned to Shinra Mansion. I tried to find my son, but could not. It was there they found me a day or so later. The Turks detained me. It was cautionary. I hadn't made contact with Midgar since the incident. Poor Tseng thought it would be a temporary measure. I knew it wouldn't be as soon as they rifled through my things. I'm astonished they did not find all of it."

Cloud tried his hardest to read something, anything, from Hojo's glib smirk. "So all along you had Dr. Famis' records."

"I acquired them nearly twenty years ago. A gift from my beloved."

"The Cetra, Lucrecia. She was the one who turned into the creature that killed Aerith's parents."

"That is correct. She knew I, of all humans, would know what to do with their belongings. Famis was an old colleague, you see. I was fond of him. Not enough to care much that he'd died, granted, but it was necessary. What good is science when it's not shared with the world?"

"You began excavating Mt. Nibel knowing full well what was beneath. Why?"

"Maybe you'll understand someday, Cloud Strife. Love can drive a man to do things of which he would have never thought himself capable."

"Where's Lucrecia now?"

Hojo did not blink, but his smirk faded. "A part of me. Always."

Cloud leaned closer. "Why are you really with us? Why are you tagging along?"

"Because where else would I go? You certainly seem to have a use for me."

"The question is, what use are we to you?"

Hojo's dark humor returned.

"Before Zack dragged you away, you were trying to make contact with Jenova, weren't you?" Cloud said. "You're hoping we'll lead you to Sephiroth."

Hojo never had the chance to respond. The front door kicked down. Cloud grabbed his Buster Sword and began a turning slash at the shrouded Public Safety Men when the room echoed with the cacophonous cry of machine gun fire. It was the round that pierced his gun arm that halted his advance and then countless stinging bullets that peppered his torso that dropped him to the ground.

Hojo cried out, genuinely rattled for the first time since his return, clutching and chairs to no avail as they dragged him into the streets.

Cloud laid cheek to the floor, seeing himself reflected in a pool of his own blood. The crimson visage seemed like that of a sinister, taunting other. His vision faded to cool, soothing gray as he heard the voices above.

"Cloud Strife is still alive."

"Kill him. Reeve says Hojo and Gainsborough need to come with us alive. He and Lockhart are buzzard food."

Cloud willed his vision to brighten and feeling and mobility to return to his extremities. The welcoming embrace of dark would have to wait.

By the time he limped out the door, three infantrymen lay dead in his bleeding wake.

* * *

Cait Sith spoke in a muted whisper from beneath her shawl. Tifa had trouble hearing and after a while, stopped listening. He was concerned for her and why should he not be? Within the last week, she had finally concluded she was broken beyond repair. Cloud saw it, but would not—could not—say a word. Aerith tried to cheer her up in her own feeble way. Their tenuous psychic link had faded to near-nothing. She could not appreciate the depths of Tifa's suffering. And then there were Vincent and Hojo. Tifa meant nothing to them. Tifa almost wished for Yuffie's company again. At least she had understood the meaning of suffering.

Tifa studied a pint of tonberries—the little green ones with brown husks. They were more blemished than not, here in the shadow of a reactor. So was nearly all of the fresh produce here. Plants were the bounty of the planet herself—the beloved sons and daughters of the Goddess. That was what Aerith had said. To see them in such a state served only as a reminder that after all of the terrible things they had done, it had not even made a difference.

Cait Sith crawled up her side. "Tifa? We've been out for almost half an hour. Shouldn't we go back?"

Tifa bought the tonberries from the adolescent boy with a makeshift storefront anyway. When she was out of earshot, she whispered back. "I didn't just leave to get the fruit. I need to think. And I needed some time to be alone."

The mechanical cat looked thoughtful, as though it had a real mind and not a circuitboard. "Tifa… I'm sorry. But I know how you feel. You weren't the only one who hurt seeing what happened to Nibelheim. I… Cloud also…"

"Well, he can't have it both ways," she snapped with surprising ferociousness. "Sometimes I need him to be the brave and strong SOLDIER. But why can't I ever just have him be a man? A real, flesh and blood human being?"

Her voice raised. People were staring. Tifa became aware of the eyes as her self-absorbtion ended. Most of the eyes peered at her from behind hoods and shawls like her own.

Then Tifa realized some of the faces were far too clean; their eyes cut through her far too deep.

She had been a fool. She had let her guard down and forgotten everything Zangan had taught her. In all likelihood, it would be the last mistake she would ever make.

The three Public Safety men stood in a triangle in front of her. She pitched the tonberries at one; the shawl at another. Cait Sith, still nestled in the shawl, struck the latter in the face. He crumpled to the ground. A limping Cait Sith appeared to have broken a servomotor. Tifa had regarded him as a friend, but in the flurry of the moment, he became just another thing to use as a weapon. He managed to scramble away unnoticed behind a pile of wicker baskets. She hoped his handler would understand.

The third infantryman stood directly in front of her. He cast aside his cloak and brought a machine gun to bear on her. She sprinted the distance between them before he could properly aim, sailed through the air, and kicked him with the full force of her body. He made a disquieting crunch when her heel dug into his ribs. Maybe he would be crippled, if he even lived. She fought on instinct cultivated from years of drills and training. "A live enemy may still harm you," Zangan had told her. Would he have ever trained her if he had known what she would become?

The last infantryman standing was not as stunned by the thrown fruit as Tifa had hoped he would be. He fired a burst of bullets. One winged her cheek, drawing blood. She barely perceived it, rushing him; spiraling towards him until her fists connected with muscle and bone. He went down hard. His head collided with a mason wall. She thought he must be dead for a moment, but then he stood to turn. She was gone already, sprinting through the serpentine labyrinth of alleys.

It was only a short walk away, but alone and scared, minutes or even seconds seemed like hours and before she remembered the motel's location, she was not running anywhere—she was just running. After the fifth or sixth alley, she turned a corner and stood in the right byroad, but why was it blotched with blood up and down? From beneath her feet to the broken door of… by the Goddess… their room. Her heart pounded and she ran. It was over.

"Tifa!"

Tifa stopped and spun on her heels. He stood behind her, at the bleeding epicenter. His Buster Sword was drawn, itself primal vermillion. He was hurt. She went towards him and only too late became aware of the man behind her. Her first mistake that afternoon should have been her last and she had just made number three. Cloud had not been trying to get her attention. He had been trying to warn her. It was a saddening miscommunication in a relationship filled with little else.

His familiar voice rasped into her ear as he pressed the gun to her chin. "We're going to settle this right here and now, Tifa…"

Cloud clenched his sword and moved with deliberation that would be invisible to all but Tifa. "If you hurt her, Cid, you're dead…"

His scraggly black beard tickled the back of her neck. "If you come any closer, she's dead."

Time passed. More footsteps became audible on the dark byroad. Reeve backed into the motel wall. Vincent and Aerith approached from opposite Cloud. Aerith fought panic. It was as clear as the late day sun.

Vincent advanced and drew that damn gun that had shot and nearly killed her once. It was almost funny. "You're surrounded, Reeve."

"So you're betraying Shinra now, Vincent?" Reeve said. "They all thought you'd be such a good Turk. I thought you at least had principles."

Vincent spoke in a low growl. "You call them 'principles?' I'm not anyone's bitch. I do as I please, when I please. Now let her go. There's nowhere to hide."

"You're right," Reeve said. "In a couple of minutes, this street will be swarming with Lieutenant Antilles' men. He's got a score to settle with all of you after Sector Five. Tseng offered you all a fair trial. Don't think you'll be getting it this time."

Vincent cocked the gun. "Your order for your men to apprehend us will be your last living act."

Tifa squirmed, but Reeve tightened his grip and clenched his teeth. "Then I may as well take a few of you with me then," he said.

Cloud inched closer.

"You're throwing away your life, Reeve," Aerith said. "It doesn't have to end this way."

"Does it?" He pressed the gun painfully against Tifa's jaw. "Then let's play a little game of question and answer. We'll let that decide for us. You're on the spotlight Tifa. Go ahead. Tell me one reason why I shouldn't blow your fucking brains out right this second. For the pain you inflicted on Midgar. For the pain AVALANCHE inflicted on me. On all the hard-working Public Safety stiffs you all hurt. For the civilians you killed."

Tifa closed her eyes. Hot tears trailed down her cheek.

"Why shouldn't I kill? Is there even single reason you should live?"

"No," Tifa whispered.

The air seemed to thicken. Reeve stammered. "What?"

"I said, 'no.'"

"Tifa!" Aerith sobbed.

"I don't deserve to live," Tifa said. "I've done a lot of bad things. I'd probably do them all again. So do it! Kill me!"

Reeve relaxed. He exhaled doubt. "You answered my question. Well then…"

He pulled the trigger.

The gunshot bounced from building wall to building wall and Tifa slumped to the ground.

Cloud's Buster Sword nearly sliced Reeve in half.

Aerith rushed to Tifa, cradling her in her arms, pressing her lips to her warm cheeks. The blood was all Reeve's. She was stunned, but very much alive.

Reeve was not half so lucky. He extended a limp hand that found Aerith's auburn tresses, staining their wake. His eyes met hers and then she touched him.

* * *

The garden burned at twilight. More properly, the charcoaled remnants of the nearby home's wooden interior burned in the garden. There were few things less flammable than barren, rocky dirt. Sirens bellowed in the distance, echoing stationary. Mothers and babies cried in an endless loop.

Aerith did not see him immediately. He waited perched on a stone bench at the outer perimeter of the garden and watched with eerie serenity. She wondered how long he had been there and then realized it had been years.

He turned to her, not Reeve as he had been years ago, but the Reeve she knew, with a stubbly black beard and wiry, bleach-tipped hair. The serenity segued to sadness. "We'd been trying for a kid for years. Shera had nothing to do with Shinra. Barret Wallace took everything away from me." He stalled, searching for the right words. "Do you understand why I did it?"

"I… I don't know."

"Love can make a man do things he would've never thought he could do."

"I'm not here to judge you."

Even in the recesses of his unconscious mind, he lit a cigarette.

"You missed on purpose," Aerith whispered. "You wanted Cloud to…"

He shrugged.

"Maybe I can heal you…"

He flashed her a sour, incredulous look. "Are you serious?"

"Yes. It's worse than any one I've ever tried, but…"

"Why in fuck's name would you do that?"

Aerith was crying. "Because you were my friend when I needed one."

He laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"Comedy's just another way of lookin' at tragedy."

Aerith blinked away her tears.

"Nah. I don't deserve it."

"Did… did Tifa give you the answer you were looking for?"

"Yeah. And I realize all along I've been askin' the wrong question."

Aerith sniffled.

"We were practically neighbors once, Aerith. Maybe we could've been friends too. I would've liked that." He stood, straightened his jacket, dropped the cigarette, and mashed it out with the toe of his hard Public Safety-issued boot. He had had his time to relax. Now he looked like a man prepared for an appointment. He turned to her with a wry, sad smile. "Well… Bye-bye for now."

Time unstuck. For the first time in three years, the fire spread and consumed all that was accepting of flame.

Aerith's eyes flashed open and she was startled to find herself among the living. Reeve was no longer.

Prone beside her, Tifa watched her with wide eyes and started to speak with quivering lips.

Aerith buried her head against Tifa's neck and pounded her chest, lashing out with rage and fear. "You idiot! You idiot! Don't you dare do that again! Don't you ever dare do that to me again!"

Tifa held her across her neck and sobbed. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

When Aerith finally looked up, she felt Cloud's eyes staring through her. She would have offered to heal him, but knew SOLDIERs healed faster than others. Besides, he would never accept her help. His soul was as opaque to her now as it had ever been.

Vincent looked up with a start and once again brandished his pistol. "They are coming."

A silver van puttered down the street towards them faster than it should have been driving. Tifa and Aerith stood. Cloud and Vincent came to attention.

Aerith sniffled. "Don't shoot, Vincent. It's her. She's back."

The van jerked to a stop so hard it left skid marks across the rustic road. The driver's door opened. "Get inside," Yuffie Kisaragi hollered.

"Yuffie?" Tifa said.

Yuffie scowled. "Are you guys deaf? They're, like, a block and a half behind me."

The mechanical cat Tifa unwittingly discarded jumped up from behind Yuffie's knees. "Quickly, quickly! They got Hojo and they'll be here any minute."

Aerith opened the rear passenger door. They scrambled inside. The wheels spun out and the vehicle jerked forward. Tifa and Cloud lurched and landed hard on the floor. The kinetic force nearly wretched Aerith away from the van when she was half inside. Vincent pulled her in and then slammed the door.

Yuffie checked the mirror. A Public Safety personnel carrier ambled into view. "Just call me getaway driver extraordinaire!" she joked.

No one laughed.

"You said you were going to your family in Wutai, Yuffie," Aerith said. "You've been following us all day."

Yuffie's smile faded. "I've been about half a day behind you since you left Nibelheim. You guys are really my family now anyway." There was darkness just behind her eyes.

"Reeve's dead," Aerith said. The words came out cold and dry.

Yuffie barely glanced at her. "Cid? Fuck. I wanted to kill him myself so bad."

Cloud watched through the back window. "They're gaining on us, Yuffie."

"You're never going to outrun them," Vincent said. "We might escape for a short period, but this van will never make it through a barricade or escape a chopper."

Cait Sith sat upright beside Yuffie. "He's right. I have an idea…"

* * *

Cait Sith and Vincent were right. It was only a matter or time before they would catch the van, but when they did, they would find nothing but a self-destructed mechanical cat. Again. Yuffie, Vincent, Cloud, Aerith, and Tifa escaped into the setting twilight sun and stayed still in the shadows just long enough to watch the Shinra platoon pass. There were choppers and barricades. No one guarded the lone, dilapidated skyrail station. The handful of fellow passengers paid them little mind as the vehicle ascended to the clouds.

Cloud wanted to speak to Tifa, but she was far away from him. Aerith sat by her side, at least in the same time zone. He fought the pain of tentatively-dressed wounds in silent agony. Even Yuffie was as quiet as he had ever seen her. The burden of too much death weighed them all down, long overdue. All the while they heard the chime of calliope and saw the flare of fireworks approach. The great amusement park in the sky bid them welcome.

* * *

_A/N: Thanks again for the reviews and please keep them coming, positive or constructive. I appreciate the feedback!_


	18. Chapter 18: Gold Saucer

**18**

**Gold Saucer**

When the poor bastard in the chocobo outfit bumbed into Yuffie, she nearly knifed him in the back. Only Aerith was able to stop her in time. Neither Vincent nor the AVALANCHE survivors had ever seen the humble flower girl move so fast. It was scarcely sundown when they arrived, but the incident served as a reminder of their long, painful day.

"I'm not gonna be able to get that damn song out of my head for a week," Yuffie grumbled. "Do they ever stop looping it?"

Cloud paid the admission fee and brushed past her towards the entrance. "I'm going to bed."

Though they were alone if not for the oblivious mascot, Aerith lowered her voice to a whisper. "Are you sure it will be safe?"

"The Gold Saucer will be shutting down the skyrail soon," Vincent said. "I doubt Public Safety will deduce we came here. Even if they do, Dio would never allow armed Public Safety men onto his park. He is one of Shinra Electric's most valuable customers. It would go all the way to Rufus Shinra, and by the time the issue were resolved, we would be long gone tomorrow." He responded to the unspoken question in Aerith's eyes. "Did I mention Dio is an old friend of mine?"

Yuffie's eyes widened to saucers. "Wow… You have friends?"

Vincent's eyes narrowed to slits. "I should learn to just ignore you."

"Aerith's got a point," Tifa said. "What if someone recognizes us? Well… no one knows our faces, but there's an off chance someone from Midgar might recognize Cloud…"

Cloud seldom raised his voice, but did so audibly now. "Then I'll just stay in my room until we leave. I'm going." He pushed further forward, into the park's central promenade.

Tifa jogged after him. "Cloud, wait."

Cloud glanced to and fro at the dark, cylindrical crawl-spaces surrounding the pastel Chocobo and Mog mural. _Speed, round, chocobo, battle, ghost, wonder,_ and_ event._ He shrugged "Where's the damn inn?"

Vincent pointed. "Ghost."

Cloud hunched his shoulders.

"It's a theme hotel," Vincent said.

Cloud walked through the portal with a huff. "I'll get us two rooms. Boys and girls. Have fun."

"Cloud. Cloud!" Tifa cast Aerith a glance and then rushed after him.

Vincent chuckled and the sound seemed to cut Aerith to the bone. "What is it you humans say? Someone has their panties in a bundle."

Aerith glowered.

Vincent's smirk faltered. "I should talk with Dio. I have not seen him in quite some time. Of course I won't mention my entourage."

It was not late, but Aerith felt the creep of tiredness. "Right…"

Yuffie wandered off. Vincent did too, in the opposite direction. Aerith stood alone by the info stand, wishing for directions.

* * *

The hotel's clerk was an automaton hanged-man. Cloud reflected that could well be him in a week or more. Maybe it already was Barret's fate. He had not asked Cait Sith about AVALANCHE's leader in several days. Cait Sith's puppeteer had substantial insider information on Shinra, but said he did not know.

Cid had also had a lot of insider information. Was Cait Sith any more trustworthy? Tifa had a suspicion about his identity and wanted to believe him. Cloud would have too, back before faith in others became an unafordable luxury.

The tub was an old-fashioned, ceramic-bowled model. Its copper hue deepened for the dried flecks and fresh blood flowing towards the drain. The hard shower water would have stung his wounds, but his nerve endings had already numbed. Most of the torso shots were absorbed by his body armor. The bullet that passed cleanly through his leave a scar forever. He curled into a ball and felt the surge of mako from within his cells swell to heal his wounds.

Somehow, the more mako pulsed through his veins and the hotter the water became, the colder his blood flowed.

* * *

She wanted to talk to Tifa, but somehow the thought of retiring to the inn made Aerith weak to the stomach. And so, she settled on wandering. On one of the upper levels was a rather trite stage play about a knight, a princess, and a dragon. A pair of lucky audience members participated. He, with long blond hair and she, with dark brown. They looked almost like a young Tifa and Cloud. Like _that_ would ever happen. It came from more than just being a wanted terrorist—Cloud seemed pathologically averse to attention. How different from Zack. Zack would have gladly taken Aerith on stage and made a big mess of the show just for giggles.

Aerith seldom realized just how much, how often, she missed him.

There was a "battle arena" in which brash young men (for they were all men on that night) fought angry monsters. They were in no real harm. If they began to lose, well-armed guards stepped in to the rescue. The contestants fought for a variety of prizes, but none fared especially well. Most prizes were dispensed from a tissue box. It had to have been someone's perverse sense of humor. Aerith did not stay for more than a few minutes. The energy there felt wrong to her.

When Aerith approached a stylish video arcade, she noticed Yuffie's presence again. She found her playing a motorcycle racing game in a back corner of the bright room. The playable character looked strangely familiar.

"Yuffie? Where have you been?" Aerith said.

Yuffie barely glanced at her. "Just got here from the Chocobo races."

"Oh… How did you do?" It would have been the sum of all fears: with Shinra hot on their heels, mob enforcers bursting into their hotel rooms over another gambling debt. Aerith hoped thugs selling her into prostitution would stay a once-in-a-lifetime thing.

Yuffie smirked. "You'll be happy to know I just about doubled the gil Tifa and Cloud swiped from Nibelheim."

Aerith wanted to ask how Yuffie had gotten ahold of said gil in the first place. She thought better of it. "How did you do that?"

"A friend of mine once told me the trick here. Always bet on black."

Aerith frowned. "Huh?"

"Teioh. He's this black chocobo that races sometimes. The odds are always way in his favor so the payout's not good one race at a time, but he literally never loses. It's unbelievable. They say he's Dio's handpicked chocobo. He may not even be a real chocobo at all."

"Well… good that we've got more money?"

Yuffie's expression sobered. Her vehicle crashed. She lost and then popped in another gold token. "Yeah."

"What happened, Yuffie?"

Her new game started and she climbed back on the toy motorcycle controller. "What do you mean?"

"Weren't you going back to Wutai to be with your family?"

"I'm not welcome."

"What?"

Yuffie shrugged. Her game character accelerated faster and faster. "I just assumed. I just assumed there'd be a home for me there. Turns out my dad wants to make all _nice_ with Shinra now. Advertise our hometown as a tourist spot. Maybe they could even get a mako reactor out of the deal. When I told him I wanted to come back home after spending all this time with AVALANCHE… well, let's just say he didn't love the idea."

"Yuffie… I'm…"

Her character crashed. She lost again. Her fists slammed hard against the toy motorcycle. "FUCK!"

People stared.

Yuffie's voice lowered to just a pip above a whisper. "Aerith… I'm sorry. I'm sorry for a lot of things. But… I need to be alone now. I don't want to do anything I shouldn't. You deserve better."

Aerith turned and walked away without turning back. She exited the arcade into the high-altitute night sky. Calliope music replaced the beeping and whirling sounds of the arcade. And then she bumped right into the jumbled aura of Vincent Valentine.

He pulled her away from his red cloak. "Is something the matter?" Was that actually concern?

"Yeah," she said. "Yuffie is in there. She's in a very dark place."

Vincent nodded, seeming to at least half-way comprehend her words. "Would you care to go for a walk?"

Aerith followed. He seemed to have a path in mind. She tried to strike up a conversation. It went about as well as she had suspected it would.

"How's your friend, Dio?" she asked.

"Well."

Other questions received monosyllabic answers.

"Did you want to try the roller coaster later?" Aerith offered.

Vincent shook his head. "The gondola ride is nice."

Aerith continued to follow, but suddenly knew where this was going. The gondola waited for them at the ledge. Its wires spiraled the Gold Saucer. Beyond it: dark oblivion. Nothing in the night sky outshone the saucer. The view from its center was deep black. It was like sitting on the edge of the Earth.

They entered the tiny compartment and sat on opposite wood benches. The gondola took to the air.

Vincent watched her for more than a minute.

Aerith fidgeted.

"So," Vincent said. "You have not been yourself since South Corel."

"A man died while I was in his unconscious mind, Vincent," Aerith said. "Give me a few days." She glanced out the window. The Chocobos raced in the cool, open air before a synthetic backdrop: too green and pure to be a real countryscape. "Why can't you…?"

"Why can't I sense the Lifestream?"

Aerith nodded.

Vincent sighed in frustration. "You really want to know, don't you?"

"I want to understand my own powers. You're the only Cetra I can ask. Besides. We're comrades." The word, "friends" would not roll off her tongue.

His gaze penetrated her as though the whole time he had known her he had never really noticed her as she was until now. "It was long ago. By your reckoning, more than a generation. The war was long-since over. To us, it seemed but a distant fairy-tale. None alive still remembered. I was a simple hunter. Good with a sword. Good with a gun. They hired me as Lucrecia's bodyguard. She was a scientist of a fashion. In those waning days, we spent our energy understanding ourselves and our powers in the context of the humans who barely knew of our existence.

"Lucrecia was angry and sick. Sicker than I could have imagined. I loved her for a time. Then she did as so many of our kind did. She chose a human mate. Only hers was no ordinary human. Hojo was different in a perverse way. Lucrecia learned all she could of Omega Weapon. She dreamed of reviving it and purging the world of humans. She was sure humans were enemies of the planet."

"And Hojo?"

"For reasons I don't know and don't care to know, he was always a man who saw fit to damn himself."

"What happened?" Aerith asked.

"She took from me what she chose and then decided I was no longer a use to her. She and Hojo saw fit to dispose of me. I lay wounded. Almost dying. I cried out to the Lifestream. I had powers such as you. I knew I had just to ask and I would be healed. It would not hear me. And then I could not hear it."

Aerith struggled to comprehend. "Why?"

"If only I knew. I did not die. Of course. I was left to wander the Earth, lost and homeless. Lucrecia had Hojo's bastard son. Sephiroth was abandoned like you and would never know his true heritage. Whatever human said, 'whatever does not kill us will only make us stronger' likely never knew true pain." Vincent glanced down and away. Fireworks cast half his face in shadow; the other half in iridescent multi-colored light. "You have your mother's eyes. She was very beautiful. I loved her for a time too. Before she met Gast. Then she died. Lucrecia's whereabouts even I don't know. Regardless, she is dead to me as well. They were the last of our kind. I'm certain of it. The humans have taken everything I loved. All they left… was you."

Aerith's mouth opened to speak. Then she stammered. "You mean…"

"Apart from Sephiroth who is only another halfbreed, we are the last, Aerith Gainsborough. Upon our deaths, the blood of the Cetra would die as well. Unless…"

Aerith covered her face in her hands. Then she began to chuckle.

Vincent blinked. "What's so funny?"

Aerith laughed aloud now. "How could I have been so…? This whole time… you've followed me for days. Saved my life. Helped all of us escape from Shinra. Just so you could get into my pants?"

Vincent clearly failed to see the humor. "You make it sound so… lewd."

"Well… It is. You definitely need more practice on pick-up lines."

He raised his voice. "Don't you understand? I'm being perfectly serious."

"Vincent, I'm a Cetra in blood only. Don't you see? I'm a twenty-two year-old girl from the mean streets of Midgar with an overprotective mom and a habit for mixing with the wrong crowd. I didn't even know I was anything other than a perfectly human until about a month ago."

"You'll appreciate your situation in time."

"Vincent… Look. You've shown us all great kindness. But my boyfriend Zack… he was vivacious. He acted more a boy than he really was. He was funny and never took life too seriously."

"What you're trying to say is he was nothing like me whatsoever."

"I want a partner who will compliment me and love me for me. Not just someone who wants to _breed_ with me."

Vincent looked out the window and sighed.

"What's wrong?" Aerith said.

"This ride is still another six minutes long."

Those six minutes were more painful than Aerith even imagined they would be. When the Gondola docked, Vincent walked onto the exit ramp hurriedly. "Think on it for a few days. Consider my offer at least," Vincent said.

Aerith shook her head. "There's nothing worth considering, Vincent. I'm…" She froze.

From beyond the short queue to board the gondola, Tifa caught her eye and waved. She had changed her clothes from the ragged skirt and t-shirt of the day before to a fresh, clean ruffled blue blouse with white trousers. Aerith almost did not recognize her and not in a bad way.

"I couldn't sleep. And I was wondering…" Tifa's face reddened. "Where you were."

Vincent glanced back and forth between the women. He grumbled. "I will be back at the hotel." Then he left.

Tifa tracked Vincent as he departed. "What was that about?"

"He wanted to talk. That's all."

Tifa hesitated before speaking. "What about?"

"It… doesn't even bear repeating."

Tifa's crimson eyes firmly met her own. "I'm tired, but I can't sleep. I need to talk to someone, but I'm too pissed off at Cloud. Can we…?"

Aerith smiled and pointed to the end of the gondola line. What was one more sleepless night?

* * *

They checked out at the crack of dawn and waited in line for the skyrail across theNorthernPass. Cloud sat in the heavy silence. Vincent had never come back to the room, but rather waited for them at the station. The girls were almost impossible to rouse. Aerith and Tifa nursed cups of drink-stand coffee, equally glazed-over and irritable. Yuffie had not been in the room with them. They found her asleep behind a bench outside of the Chocobo races. At least she had some perceptible enthusiasm.

It had been a long, bleak day on top of a long, bleak month-or-more. For Cloud and Tifa, it had been even longer. He watched how she avoided his gaze. If there truly was a Goddess, maybe someday she would forgive him for everything he had done to her.

The trip down from the Gold Saucer seemed to take far longer than the trip up. His mind was not racing nearly so hard. The pain seemed as bad, if not worse than it had been the night before. There were fewer endorphins to dull the ache. The view was far less opulent in the daytime. It no longer looked like a magical floating kingdom. Instead: just a very big tower.

When they exited at the station, Cloud was first and foremost happy to find that a platoon of Public Safety men was not waiting for them. Hotels, service stations, and gift shops cluttered near the highway on-ramp. The terrain was strikingly barren. Whatever had been left ofNorth Correlwas nowhere to be found.

"Costa Del Solis a good eight hour drive. In good traffic. You can no doubt find a ship to Modeoheim. From there, it's not a long trek to what's left of Icicle Inn." Vincent walked off.

Aerith at last spoke a complete sentence. "Aren't you coming with us?"

Vincent continued to walk. "I'm clearly not needed." Without another word, he vanished into a sea of people and then, simply vanished.

Cloud watched Aerith's face. Clealy he had missed something. When Tifa failed to remark on the encounter, he finally shrugged it off. "Let's go."

Renting a car was a no-brainer. The rental shop was just a block from the station. They needed transportation and stealing was out of the question. They were finally off Shinra's radar. Maybe. For now. They had to keep it that way. Only one of them was not a wanted terrorist.

"You do the talking," Cloud told Aerith.

Aerith grumbled compliance and led Tifa and Cloud into the bright silver building with a long desk and a bored-looking clerk.

"Excuse me," Aerith said. She was tired and nervous. That much was obvious.

The clerk looked up from her computer. She lowered her reading glasses and focused on Aerith. "Why, yes?"

"Do you all have an office inCosta Del Sol?" Aerith asked.

"We do."

"I'd like to rent a van for a few days and drop it off there."

Her eyes flashed with recognition. "Are you Miss Aerith Fair?"

Aerith flinched. "What?"

"We received a call from a friend of yours earlier and he said you would have green eyes and pretty curly brown hair. I would only assume he meant…?"

"Well…" Aerith glanced back to Cloud and Tifa, searching for some kind of cue.

"The van is already paid for." She smiled.

Aerith nodded slowly. "Well then… I guess…?"

The lights shut abruptly. Only the light of the rising sun illuminated the room. A rumble coarsed through the building. The earth growled.

Yuffie opened the door, but did not turn away from the southern sky to look in. "Cloud. Tifa. Aerith. Get out here!"

They rushed out to black stoplights and dark storefronts. The darkness of man-made lights was not nearly as grim as the cloud of dismal gray spreading from beyond the Gold Saucer.

* * *

_a/n: LoTC was nominated for a Genesis Award for Best AU fic! After the story's finished, I'll probably post a supplemental chapter filling in a few blanks. __Once again, thanks for ongoing feedback!_


	19. Chapter 19: That Night in Costa Del Sol

_A/N: Apologies for the lack of a March update. Last month was kinda crazy. Hopefully I can stay on track for an update a month from here on out. Oh yeah. On my Profile Page, I note LotC is "Rated M for just about everything that could warrant an 'M' rating (eventually)." Well, this and subsequent chapters will contain more pieces of that 'M' rating. Be forewarned. Anyhow, thanks for reading!_

* * *

**19**

**That Night in Costa Del Sol**

No one took credit for the barricade and wisely so. It was just a tape line, really. A lot of tape: surrounding the oldest free-standing structure in all of Gaia.

"You fuckin' serious?"Renoasked a Shinra sentry. "The guy who's gonna try to get in flies and has a sword bigger than you."

If the sentry was affronted, he dared not show it. "Not my work, sir."

"Leave him alone,Reno. You coming or not?" Cissnei ducked under the tape line.

"Alright, alright. I'm coming. Christ, why couldn't they have sent Rude?"

Cissnei did not bother to turn. "I heard that."

Reno crossed the shaky suspension bridge and approached the entryway of weathered stone. In the time since its masons had taken that long dirtnap, Reno's existence had only been a wink in the goddess' eye. It was breezy and humid. Few things he had ever seen surpassed the beauty of the forest, but the forest ended in a mile's radius of burnt timber and scorched earth. At its center, theTempleof the Ancients sat undisturbed in silent serenity.

_Until the day the world ends._

It was not quite a pyramid: rather a complex of spires and septums surrounding a central ziggurat. Renofollowed Cissnei through a maze of hieroglyph-covered walls. His flashlight illuminated images chiseled in relief beneath writing. A ship sailed from the sun (or at least _a_ sun) towards an Earth filled with identical, agrarian people bearing grain and fruit. Men emerged from the ship walking before a wall of fire. The agrarian people fled in panic. Corpses littered the earth. At the summit of the great ziggurat, a faceless woman placed a stone on an alter. The second-to-last carving was a strange man spitting flame. The last carving was blank.

Renofelt a chill. "You heard about South Corel?"

Cissnei did not respond visibly beyond a clenching of her jaw. "Yeah. I did. Not much mako left outside Junon and the greater Midgar power grid. Who knew?"

"Who knew what?"

"We'd live to see the end of mako power."

"We could just live to see the end of all human life, Cissnei."

Cissnei scowled. "Reno. Seriously…"

He shrugged. "What? We all gotta go sometime. Least this way we can see it comin'. I don't know about you, but Sephiroth takes out the Junon and Midgar plants and makes his way here, fuck it. I'm throwin' an End of the World Party. You're all invited. I may as well drink till I black out and nail as many brunettes as I can before it's all over. Maybe not in that order."

"Pig."

"Bite me." Renocrouched as they crawled past a dislodged stone. "I miss Elena sometimes."

"Because she put up with your shit?"

Renoblinked. "How did you know?"

Neither saw the approach of the graying middle-aged man in khakis. "Excuse me. Are you the Turks?" he asked.

Cissnei appraised him. He had the poofiest moustacheRenohad ever seen. If there was any doubt to his identity, he wore a Shinra ID badge. "Professor Alexander. It's a pleasure. You can call me Cissnei. This isReno."

He shook their hands in turn, taking an extra moment to squeeze Cissnei's. "The pleasure is all mine."

Renorolled his eyes.

"Have you found anything of interest?" Cissnei asked.

"Very much indeed. This area's been restricted for so long. There aren't many Cetra ruins left, you understand. I would have loved to have seen the surrounding area before… um…"

Renosmirked. "Sorry, Doc. Security interests always come first. Remember: this thing wants to kill us. Whatever it is."

At Rufus' order, the Turks had ordered theTempleof the Ancients to be hit with just about every type of munition in Shinra's arsenal. The surrounding forest had not stood a chance. It burned for the better part of a day. That was, until the tactical nuke vaporized it. The temple at its center still sat unmolested. When the flash of the nuclear bomb dissipated, the video recorders detected the faintest hint of a blue aura coating the structure of the temple like a vinyl glove. It was gone within seconds. "Well…" Tseng had said, "It looks like something doesn't want us to blow it up." In lieu of destroying it, understanding it seemed like the next best course of action.

Professor Alexander straightened fishbowl glasses and grimaced. "Of course."

"Care to give us the grand tour?" Cissnei asked.

The professor guided them through a maze of corridors and translated fragments of text on the walls. He told them the walls recalled Cetra encounters with "The Calamity From the Sky." Most of them could be better called "battles." Some: "massacres."

Ever flippant, never to be taken taken too seriously, Renohad an odd thought. _The Cetra had good reason to be pissed off at us._

At the ruins' center, they scaled the tall, uneven steps to the ziggurat. With badly weather steps and without a hand rail, it was a long, precarious walk. Worse yet, when they neared the top, the wind picked up. It had to have been at least a hundred meter tumble to the ground below.

_They also had some serious balls_.

At the summit, they entered a small room beyond torn-assunder doors. No. It was a shrine. The wall carvings became more abstract and elaborate. A feminine figure against the wall opposite the entrance was the only thing recognizable, her hands outstretched—a flowing gown and wispy hair spread across cold granite.

"She doesn't have a face,"Renosaid.

"The Goddess is all women," Professor Alexander said.

Renogave a petulant glower. "Then how come there's no god to go along with her?"

"Because the Goddess is what men want, but can never have; what they aspire to, but can never become. If women ruled the world then perhaps there would be a god instead."

Cissnei smirked and she wantedRenoto see her do it. He held himself back from spitting out something profane.

The pedestal stood in the room's center. No. It was an altar. Relief carvings of the same wordless, swirling script climbed its flank to two protruding slots: one on either half of the altar. It was not granite like the rest, but half marble and half onyx, split evenly along the center: to the onyx, a fierce spulpted body with the wings of a falcon, and to the marble, an earthbound sculpture, serene and calm.

"Is that…?"Renosaid.

"These appear to be the docking stations for the two materia. To activitate Omega Weapon, the Cetra or Jenova must first dock the Holy Materia here." He pointed to the onyx.

Renoscowled. So the frightening black one was "Holy." It was funny in a way that did not make him want to laugh at all.

"And the other?" Cissnei asked.

"The Earth Materia must be docked here. Once the Holy Materia has activated, nothing can stop Omega Weapon but the Earth Materia. Think of it as a deactivation code."

Renoglanced at Cissnei. She knew as much as he and was no doubt thinking similar thoughts. Aerith Gainsborough had the Earth Materia. The White Materia. The "Deactivation Code." She was last seen with Sephiroth and was missing or dead.

Lieutenant Antilles' surviving men confirmed the presence of Cloud Strife and Tifa Lockhart in South Corel. There was even a sighting of Yuffie Kisaragi, but no one could, or would, positively identify Aerith Gainsborough. It did not help that even citizens who were not vagrants or criminals still despised Shinra there. Some sins were harder to forgive than others. Professor Hojo was back in custody. Rufus sent him to Junon so Scarlet could personally interrogate him. As much as he disliked her, the president had to acknowledge she did _some_ things well. As of yet though, Hojo was not saying a word about AVALANCHE, Jenova, or his whereabouts since Cosmo Canyon and Scarlett could be _very_ persuasive given the circumstance.

_The keys to a doomsday device are out there somewhere and we had and lost the only way to stop it._

* * *

Aerith's white pendant almost dangled free as she bolted to the bathroom. Cloud had refused to take bathroom breaks except once when they needed to refuel the rental. Due to the traffic of a panicked citizenry, the drive had taken all day. It did not help that no one brought much food. All they had to sate themselves were soft drinks bought by Yuffie. She had bought a lot of them. Tifa was banging on the door before she was half-way done relieving her bladder. At the Gold Saucer they had seemed closer than ever before. Now both found themselves in equally dour moods.

Aerith stepped out of the beachside outhouse as Tifa rushed in. Aerith finally noticed her surroundings. Had she not stopped to open her eyes, she would have never seen the most beautiful, terrible sight of her life.

The twilight sun cast long shadows from palm trees and shot twinkling iridescent light across the vast ocean. She was inCosta Del Sol. Zack had always wanted to come with her to the lazy beachside town. Both arrived separately. Zack never left.

A family of four who looked Wutainese played volleyball by the surf. Scattered middle-aged men and women sunbathed by the beach, sipping fluorescent cocktails. Everyone seemed relaxed if not for the buzz of nervous energy on the fringe of most of the tourists' hearts. An enormous, hand-written banner spanned their hotel: a little cabana right on the shore. _No Mako? No problem! We burn oil!_

Rather cheerful. A humanoid monster had destroyed the power grid of half a continent and a small city housing it. Do not let that ruin your vacation, the sign seemed to say.

Cloud padded past her towards the cabana. Even without saying a word, his sulkiness seeped through. Yuffie ran towards a beachside shop. "Hey Aerith. Boobs. Lets get bathing suits."

"No," Aerith yelled and was surprised to hear Tifa's voice say the same from not three feet behind.

They looked at each other and then looked away. Aerith turned beet red. Tifa did likewise. It had been a painfully long van ride in a painfully cramped van Someone had to speak.

Aerith took the plunge. "Look, Tifa about last night..."

Tifa focused on a figure lounging by the beach. "Is that…?"

Aerith knew she would dodge the issue. "Tifa…?"

Tifa walked towards him now: the young man with sunglasses and slick red hair, shirtless, sunning on a lounge chair, flipping through a sappy novel. Aerith followed, exasperated. "Johnny?" Tifa said.

He feigned surprise at her presence, peering at them beneath his sunglasses, his eyes taking in both women in turn. "Well. If it isn't Tifa Lockhart."

"I haven't seen you since…"

He smiled ruefully. "Yeah. I know."

"Aerith, this is Johnny. We grew up together."

He watched Aerith with intent, but she was frankly not in the mood to read too deeply into this distraction. "It's nice to meet you."

"I'm glad to see you're… Alive," Johnny said. He seemed none too surprised.

"Yeah. Alive and kicking." _For now,_ Aerith heard Tifa think. She was getting nervous and broadcasting. At least Aerith knew of no one else who could tune in. "What are you doing here?"

He shrugged. "On vacation. I live in Junon, but travel a lot. And you?"

Tifa edged back. "Oh, passing through."

Johnny grinned. "Actually, I'm here waiting for my girl."

Relief washed over Tifa's face. "Oh… you have a girlfriend now? That's sweet."

"Yeah," Johnny said. "Someday I think I may ask her to marry me. But not today."

Tifa edged away. "Well… good luck. I hope that goes well. Listen. I need to meet up with some friends."

"It was nice running into you." He offered a wave.

"By for now!" Tifa turned and walked away briskly.

"He's…?"

"He had the biggest crush on me growing up. Everyone knew it. It's kind of funny how things change. It's not like we even have a lot to talk about now, but… it makes you think, doesn't it?"

"What?"

"Even if we survive all of this, will I ever be able to account for the last two years of my life? Will I even be left with anything at all?"

"Tifa…"

Tifa sped up. "So where is Cloud anyways?"

Aerith followed, exasperated.

* * *

The fat cabana boy sweat hard beneath a bright yellow palm-tree shirt and nibbled on a day-old doughnut. A battery-operated fan blew musty air across his face. The sign outside advertised the building was powered. It was at least mostly accurate. A flickering lamb swayed in the breeze overhead. He ignored Cloud until he was two feet away. "Can I help you?" he asked without really looking at him. That was probably for the best.

"I need two rooms," Cloud said.

He snickered. "Yeah. I get that a lot."

Cloud shuffled his feet. Patience came at a premium lately. "Is there a vacancy?"

"Usually is, but everything else around here's shut down for the season. Lose a little electricity and suddenly everyone wants to leave town. You got a reservation?"

Cloud remembered the van rental and acted on a hunch. "Have you got anything under 'Aerith Fair'?"

He looked up, at last seeing Cloud. "Oh. You must be with him." He pointed to a rustic old desk next to Cloud.

"Huh?" Cloud turned and nearly jumped. The tiny mechanical cat sat in sleeper-saver mode not four feet away. "What the… What are you doing here? Didn't you…?"

Cait Sith remained motionless.

Cloud turned back to the Cabana boy who shrugged. "It was talking earlier. It hasn't done anything for at least an hour."

Cloud poked Cait Sith and the cat jumped into motion with a barely-audible whirl of servomotors. "I thought you'd never get here," Cait Sith said.

"When did you… How did you…? Didn't you…?" Cloud stammered.

"I have my ways," Cait Sith said. "It's good to always keep a spare."

The cabana boy's eyes widened to saucers. "Can I buy him for fifty gil?"

It was tempting… but… "No," Cloud said.

"Not even with a luxury suite?"

"No."

"I can throw in a few doughnuts."

"No."

The front door squeaked and then pulled shut hastily. "Are we checked in yet?" Tifa asked.

Cait Sith turned. "Tifa! Aerith!"

The cabana boy turned when Cait Sith announced the girls' names. He registered their presence and then knelt below the counter, returning with two sets of keys. "Room 105 and 107. Enjoy your stay."

They received the keys and filed down the hall. Cloud glowered at Cait Sith and mumbled under his breath. "He recognized us."

"What?"

"When you said Tifa and Aerith's names," Cloud said. "There was recognition. Wasn't there, Aerith?"

Aerith balked for a half-second before she responded. Cloud had always seemed reluctant to acknowledge her powers. "He did. I'm pretty sure of it."

"It's not too late to look for another inn," Tifa said.

"You'll be hard-pressed to find one so near the port," Cait Sith said.

"To be fair, I didn't sense any hostile intent or caution from the desk clerk," Aerith said. "We could have just seemed familiar."

"I say we stay. Just be cautious," Cloud said. He reached the end of the hallway and began unlocking the chipped door to room 105. "This is my room. The girls will be in room 107."

"Shouldn't we meet for a few minutes?" Tifa asked. "I can get Yuffie."

"Let her have her fun and come in later. What do we have to meet about? We sleep here tonight and tomorrow get on that barge to Modeoheim." Cloud opened the door and enetered.

"Well…?" Cait Sith began. "I'll see you girls tomorrow?"

"Who said you were invited in?" Cloud snarled.

The door slammed.

"Cloud," Tifa cried. She opened the door after him and entered.

Cait Sith and Aerith stood sheepish, alone in the hallway.

* * *

Aerith tried to sleep, but could not. There was too much noise. Not the noise of the ocean. Not the noise of the beach-goers. No, the _other_ kind of noise. It was the bee-buzzing swarm of confused thoughts in flight and it permeated the thin walls between her room and Cloud's. She had to get away and before she realized it, she found herself dressed in the lobby, alone in the half-light.

Almost alone. Cait Sith sat perched by the lone lamp, still unwelcome in Cloud's room. He was not in his powered-down sleeper mode, but rather fully alert. She could tell by the twitching of its ears and tail: autonomatic reactions to make the unliving thing seem more alive. If a robot could ever seem distracted, he was.

Aerith sat down down next to it. "You're worried, aren't you?"

The mechanical cat rubbed its head. Another gesture without practical purpose. "I shouldn't. It's just that… I don't like seeing them like this."

Aerith felt sympathy for the cat's human handler. "How long have you loved her?"

The puppet did not act startled. For once it gave away none of its puppeteer's feelings. "I don't want to talk about it."

Aerith exhaled and settled back into the worn nylon sofa. "I'm sorry."

Cait Sith did not speak for what seemed like minutes. "I did it all for her, you know. I wanted to protect her. And for what? I'm starting to think we're all just going to die anyway."

Aerith started to speak but heard shuffling from the office behind the counter and hushed. The fat cabana boy rubbed his eyes awake and walked to the counter. His eyes focused on Cait Sith, and then her.

"I didn't mean to disturb you," he said.

"You're not," Aerith said.

He looked at her with that deep look of recognition again. "Hey, I'm sorry. Are you Tifa or Aerith?"

Aerith inhaled and sat rigid. "Aerith."

His eyes narrowed. "Aerith… Gainsborough?"

She hesitated. "Yes."

He retreated to his office for about five minutes. She and Cait Sith watched each other with silent questions. The cabana boy finally emerged. A yellow-brown envelope lay in his hand. "You've got a letter. It was left here…"

Aerith silenced him with a curt nod. She did not need for him to tell her who left it and under what circumstances. She knew it from the moment she arrived. This place was heavy with _him_. She took the letter with a "thank you."

"I should go… power down," Cait Sith said.

"I'm going outside," Aerith said. She could go anywhere but back to those rooms.

* * *

Zack's mood declined from the moment they left Nibelheim until it reached a deep gulley past the ruins ofNorth Corel. When Cloud parked the car Zack hotwired in Gongaga by the beachside resort late at night, they had to drag him out of the passenger seat. He was rigid—shy of comatose. Both with an arm across his back, they walked him into the lobby. A muscular teenager with cropped blond hair glanced up from his magazines at their entrance. It did not help their escape cross-country that they made a striking trio. He checked them into two rooms and watched them closely.

They walked Zack to his and Cloud's room where he sat down by the bed. He rocked and combed his fingers through his hair.

Cloud shook him gently. He had avoided acknowledging there was a problem, but it was impossible to ignore any longer. "Zack…?"

He looked up. Tifa found it eerie how much his eyes matched Cloud's. "I'm never gonna see her again, am I?"

Cloud spoke in a cautious whisper. "What are you talking about? We're almost home."

Transparent Zack's face became opaque. He smiled with the quirk of a corner of his lip. "Yeah. We are, aren't we?"

"Hang in there. It's almost over."

Tifa no longer liked Zack's smile. "Yeah. It's almost over."

Tifa bid her goodnight and walked across the hall to her room. She was tired of both of them. She needed them and knew they cared for her, but she felt as much their hostage as if Shinra had taken them. She found the dresser mirror and took off the tank top she had found in theSouth Corelbazaar. The wound had healed as much as it ever would and it still hurt when she thought about it. She scar would be hideous and she would carry it for the rest of her life.

Her door jiggled. Then the lock twisted. Cloud and Zack's spare key. He balked seeing her half-nakedness. Then he shut the door behind him and locked it.

The rage that had simmered for weeks bubbled over. He nearly stopped at his glare. "Get out."

He came closer. "Tifa… I'm sorry…"

"I said get out! Get out! Get out! Get out!"

His touch was cold.

"Don't touch me!"

He held her, quivering and somehow Tifa understood: from the moment he pledged to become a SOLDIER for her sake, she would never be able to detach him from her.

She remained still and let him hold her until his touch no longer hurt and her crying ceased.

She let him kiss her neck until she became accustomed to the brush of his lips and met them with her own.

She caressed him and when he tried to enter her, she allowed it.

For all of eight hours, until the morning, they were closer than she had ever been with anyone.

Tifa remembered that night years ago as Cloud sleek, sweating body pressed to hers and filled her with a pain she had not known in years.

She felt guilty with Aerith and maybe Cait Sith; maybe Yuffie in the room next door. At least Aerith had to know. Tifa never meant for it to happen. She only meant to snap at his rudeness, but when she approached, she saw his damage closer than she had seen it since that night. Even after all of their years together, she was still not sure she truly loved him, but after their time in AVALANCHE, she was at least sure they deserved each other.

She told herself that with every thrust deeper and deeper into her core until finally he could go no deeper and released without warning.

He held her. He never told her he loved her. He was a man of few words and that much was obvious. For a moment, she was content.

Maybe this time, they would stay that way through the next morning.

* * *

Aerith stood by the crashing waves. Her hands trembled, clenching the balled-up, yellowed letter. It was too dark to read or see, so when she became aware of the presence of another, she knew he was not behind behind her or beside her. He was nowhere near her at all.

Aerith sniffled away a tear. "Who's there? Sephiroth? Jenova? Who?"

She spun around until she was dizzy, trying to find a person she knew was not there; trying to find cold green eyes she knew she would never see. She tumbled into the sand, still clutching the letter tight to her chest. "I know you're watching. I know it."

The inside of her head heard a dark, cold chuckle.

"It was you all along. You did it, didn't you?" She shook the tattered letter. "This wasn't him! This was not Zack Fair!"

_You're so sure, are you child?_

"He never would have done it. I knew him. I loved him. You did it to him, didn't you?"

_He did it to himself. They all did. From the moment he filled himself with the lifeblood of our planet his bretheren sucked away. For him and the others in Shinra, it was a fuel. It was an elixir of power. It was none of that. It was lifeforce. It was the breath of air. It was the flicker of dimming souls…_

"Shut up! What gives you the right? I loved him. He… he was going to marry to me."

His voice silenced.

Aerith as the pain she had kept coiled like a snake for two years sprang. "Why? You took him from me. He was all I had. Now he'll no longer laugh. Or talk. Or cry. What about me? What am I supposed to do?"

_Perhaps you should be thankful you were loved at all._

And then he was gone.

Her mouth was dry. Her fingers tingled. She was cold all over. She unraveled the letter written here two years before and began to read again.

_ To my dearest Aerith,_

_ Feel no regret: only joy for you are beloved by the Goddess. I tried my hardest to reach you, but could no longer continue. My soul, corrupted by vengeance hath endured torment, to find the end of the journey in my own salvation._

_ You must carry on. Be brave for me. Be brave for your mother. Legend shall speak of sacrifice at world's end. The winds sail over the water's surface; calm but sure._

_ I offer thee this silent sacrifice._

_ Love,_

_ Zack_

Fresh sorrow washed over her. She remembered the plucky young SOLDIER when they first met: still little more than a boy. She remembered their first real date. She remembered him helping her sell cut flowers from a little cart on the surface of Midgar for the first time. He was so loud Public Safety troops would have arrested him had they not recognized him as a SOLDIER. They were part of his "fan club." Cocky as he was, to her, he had never seemed like the kind of man with a fan club. To her, he had always just been Zack Fair and she loved him for it.

Zack did not write that letter. Not entirely. It was written in his hand, but the thoughts belonged to something else.

* * *

Cloud and Tifa woke up the next morning. She was surprised to find him by her side in bed. What day was it again? Had they really done that? Neither spoke. She dressed shyly, but when he smiled that genuine smile of his, she could only smile in return. Maybe it would be alright this time.

Then they passed room 103 on the way to the lobby. Somehow its presence had not bothered her before, but now she found herself unable to escape the sight of Zack Fair hanging lifeless from the ceiling fan.

Cloud tried not to react the same way he had that morning two years ago, but still shied away from her.

Aerith watched them with dry, parched eyes from the lobby sofa. At her feet lay a mass of shredded paper. She was wearing her outfit from the night before. Yuffie laid down by her side and in her lap, a silent Cait Sith.

Maybe Aerith tried to hide any feelings of betrayal. If she did, she did so poorly. Tifa approached. Aerith stood up hastily and left.

And that was that.

Yuffie stirred when Aerith moved and then Cait Sith awakened.

Cloud gave Tifa a quizzical look and then it was her turn to disengage further from him. His face betrayed little emotion. It never really did. Then he approached the front desk to check out. While Tifa gathered the others, Aerith waited outside.

When they left for the docks, they left behind a dozen more things unsaid.

* * *

The sea breeze stang. The air chilled as they puttered further north on the ship bound for Modeoheim. The captain was a bearded man named Cid and that spooked Cloud. Aerith was numb to it. She was numb to it all. As she approached the home she had not seen in over a dozen years, she felt nothing. Yuffie was oblivious. Cait Sith could not take his eyes off of Tifa and Tifa knew something was wrong, but avoided her. She did not want to talk about the night before. It seemed for the best. Aerith did not want to talk either. She just wanted to be left alone.

She never told them of her encounter on the beach. The hurt was too much. Still, she would regret not telling them.

She would regret not telling them for the rest of her life.


	20. Chapter 20: One Winged Angel

_A/N: So, I've been preparing for this chapter for a while. Once again, I hope you like it!_

* * *

**20**

**One Winged Angel**

Late one summer almost a decade ago, it was so hot on the Tamblin Plains the SOLDIERS and the Public Safety infantrymen together loitered outside of their tents shirtless—sunning, playing volleyball, listening to music, and drinking beverages they had not been able to find at the Base Station commissary. Except Angeal. He was half-way gone. His tour was ending and he refused a redeployment. Maybe that made him weak. Maybe that made him smart.

Auron and Jecht, two of the Second Classes, lingered not far away. The two infantrymen form Company B, Irvine and Zidane, stood closer by. They were probably in Genesis' fan club. Genesis himself paid them no mind and only poured over the play manuscript he had read a dozen times just since their deployment. The two Pubic Safety grunts did not seem to mind. Apparently, that fashionably aloof side of Genesis accounted for much of his allure.

Sephiroth despised the "fan clubs." Just the same, he understood something of that spark they saw in Genesis. "Sometimes a broken heart isn't worth mending and all you can do is throw it out with the trash," Genesis told him once. He had always wished he himself were incapable of caring—caring about life; the world; the sorrow of the lifestream. Everything.

When the tinges of night began to fall, scattered mumbles spread like a wave from the northernmost edge of the encampment. Sephiroth watched a crowd of Public Safety grunts part. A little Wutainese girl approached with shuffling feet. Her hair was adorned with a pale yellow bow. She carried a tan leather bundle wrapped tight to her chest.

A murmer of voices emerged through the chaos.

"What's the kid doing…?"

"…just a damn wetback…"

"C'mon, she's just a little lost kid…"

"… Shouldn't be here, little girl."

Zidane approached the girl and knelt to her level. He hushed the others. "Hey…"

The girl refused to look up.

"It's okay…" Zidane rushed back to his tent and emerged a moment later with a half-eaten candy bar. "You hungry girl?"

"No," she whispered. She made no attempt to take the candy.

Zidane put it down. "You lost?"

She nodded her head slowly.

"You have a name?"

She mumbled something inaudible.

"Huh?"

"Eiko."

"Okay… You need some way home…?"

"Get her outta here," Jecht barked. "She's not supposed to be here."

Zidane frowned. "She's just a kid."

"Yeah, but she's one of _them_ and she's got parents."

"She's probably just a lost kid from Da Chao a little ways away. It's a peaceful village."

While Zidane and Jecht went back and forth, Sephiroth tuned into the girl—listened to the voices of the lifestream within her. A tear rolled down her quivering cheek and her emotions whirled and swirled in a frightful tempest. She was hurt. She was lonely. She was afraid. She was afraid of the SOLDIERS. She was afraid of the Public Safety infantrymen.

Most of all, she was afraid of the bundle of explosives wrapped tight in her arms. The elders at Da Chao set them to detonate any second now.

Sephiroth cried out too late. Genesis and Jecht dove for cover. The infantrymen had not been graced with the wired reflexes inherent to Mako treatment. Mostly, they stood bemused while it happened. Sephiroth would never remember a sound. Only a blinding flash of light and a ring in his ears that lasted days.

Zidane half-way vaporized. Most of the infantrymen closest to the detonation died instantly. Most of the rest agonized in disfigured misery.

They never found anything left of the girl. Her existence vanished altogether.

When Sephiroth became aware of sound again, the moans and cries of the wounded and dying filled his ears.

Auron groaned, dying nearby.

"Fucking Public Safety asswhipes," Jecht growled, largely unhurt.

Then Sephiroth heard her voice. It was a voice he had never heard before and it was a voice he would never hear again.

_Behold, my son. This is Man. This is his way._

Then the voice vanished from the depths of his brain and Sephiroth realized he was covered in blood and a lot of it belonged to him. Genesis lay prone by his side and most of the rest was his.

* * *

"Sometimes a broken heart isn't worth mending and all you can do is throw it out with the trash." It was Genesis, not Sephiroth who had been born with the soul of a poet. That had been Genesis' parting gift to him. "You must go on," Genesis' voice whispered in his mind as his head skipped across the Midgar training room. "You must go on and take me with you." And so Sephiroth lived on with a petulent voice of unbridled madness to accompany the million voices of the planet's sorrow.

Genesis had been the first to undergo the high dose of mako treatment. Sephiroth had been the primary candidate.

"You are too important to Shinra," Professor Hojo told him. "You are unique. Maybe one of a kind. We have to make sure nothing goes wrong first."

Something always went wrong.

The strange unnatural bond between Sephiroth and Genesis grew from that point: fueled by the science of a man Sephiroth would never acknowledge as a father. His was a glimmer of friendship and camaraderie in a sterile life filled with teachers and Shinra handlers. When Sephiroth ended Genesis' life, he felt the closest he had ever felt to sorrow, but in the end, it proved to be little more than the sorrow of feeling next to nothing.

At Nibelheim, Jenova changed him, but only to the extent that it opened his eyes to truths he had blinded himself to for most of his life. It molded him to its image and made him the avenger he always knew he had to become.

And now the world would tremble: starting with three women and a man traversing the ice and snow of the far north.

* * *

The parkas kept them warm and shielded from the blistering cold well enough. The Fahrenheit's captain sold them at an exorbitant price. What choice was there, really? Cloud had not stopped to think about buying cold-weather clothing before they left for Costa Del Sol and it was not even worth trying to find parkas in a subtropical resort town. They could have waited until their arrival in Modeoheim, but the ship was cold the last day of the voyage. Besides: Tifa was still wearing her white tank-top. He did not want anyone else to have _that_ sight.

She clung to his waist, seated beind him on their jet ski. Cait Sith clung to her side. There was just no getting around it. Aerith clung behind Yuffie on the snow ski at their side. In a flash, he remembered the day they met Aerith in Midgar and the wild bike ride preceeding that meeting. He remembered the way Tifa clung to his back.

It was the story of their lives.

One day, Cloud told himself, he would be a worthy man for Tifa. In the meantime he would keep apologizing every few days, weeks, or months. He would have apologized for that night in Costa Del Sol, but at some point he had to at least pretend he had done the right thing. Tifa loved him. At least she believed she loved him and that was as good as real for most. He tried not to hold that against her.

Even he could not fathom really loving what he had become.

"We're almost there," Aerith shouted from behind. Cloud saw the frozen wooden spire jutting out from the snow and ice and slowed to a stop. Yuffie did the same.

Aerith rubbed her hands and looked away from Cloud when he turned to her. She was in his head again. Cloud called it "mako," but it was the essence of the Lifestream. It was strong in both of them. He was past frustrated with it, but he had to wonder what she had told Tifa. He had always been a private man and living in close quarters with a woman who could read his thoughts disturbed him to no end. Zack had loved her and he could see why. But then, Zack was an open book.

Aerith got off the jet ski. He had never seen an expression quite like hers in that moment. This was the place of her birth. It was also an icy tomb. The spire was a church steeple: one that had not rung in about twenty years. Icycle Inn was over two centuries old. It had taken only a generation for the Planet to reclaim it.

Aerith took off her gloves and fumbled through a backpack until she found the pale crimson materia. It flickered in her hand. She held it close to her skin.

"Be careful, Aerith," Tifa said.

Aerith glanced over her shoulder at Tifa and then sealed her eyes. Her hair ends lifted. A spark flickered in front of her: dimly at first but more and more radiant as the air crackled with power. The flame grew. Stray flecks of snow and ice vanished in a misty haze. Aerith's eyes opened and the flame lanced forth, arcing to and fro across the icy waste. Steam washed across their faces, cooling in the frozen air quickly, but filling their nostrils with vapor and dank, frozen decay. When the vapor cleared, before them lay a wasteland of rotten, cinged lumber.

Tifa rooted through what had once been a single-family dwelling. She emerged a moment later with a half-burned rag doll. Her skin had been flushed bright red for the cold, but now she looked almost pale. Cloud understood. They had seen too much ruin in too little time.

"I don't see any bodies," Yuffie said, almost nonchalant.

"You won't," Cloud said. "They're not here anymore."

Tifa gave him a puzzled, mortified look.

"Animals," Cloud said.

"But I don't see any…" Tifa said.

"They're here," Cloud said. "Even this far north."

Tifa continued her flummoxed stare. Cloud had been this far north once before as a SOLDIER. The bandersnatches only came out at night and mostly scavenged, but when short of food, might willfully attack a human party. They avoided talking about the past whenever possible. Tifa remembered him as the friendly boy in Nibelheim and the penetant ex-SOLDIER. Perhaps it was best not to further complicate things that were already too complicated.

"What are we looking for anyway?" Yuffie asked.

Aerith weaved between burnt-out homes, following some thread of intuition or scent. "I don't know," Aerith said. "Maybe there's something left here. There has to be. I just know it somehow. We still don't know what happened to the Black Materia. Sephiroth obviously doesn't have it and doesn't know where it is. I just don't know what…" She stopped on a dime in pile of rubble. Many of the homes were mostly intact. This one had been demolished utterly. Complicated emotions raced through her brain. That much was obvious from the anxious flicker of her eyes and her taut lips.

Maybe she was remembering.

"This is it." Aerith's voice was scarcely above a whisper.

"What happened here?" Yuffie asked.

"You saw it yourself in the video," Tifa said.

Yuffie pouted.

"Lucrecia joined with the monster, Chaos," Aerith said. "When Vincent saved me from Sephiroth in CosmoCanyon, he did something similar." Aerith shuffled through the wood. "She completely destroyed Icycle Inn and killed everyone in it." She stroked the materia by her bosom and then turned her attention back to the lumber. "Help me Cloud. Please."

Cloud balked and then approached, lifting the lumber with ease and tossing it aside while Aerith struggled to budge it. The mako made him stronger than two men.

The damn mako.

After about ten minutes of foraging, Aerith found the frozen picture of her family. She was a little girl. Her mother looked so much like her. The colors faded, but the picture was otherwise perfectly preserved in the unchanging snow. More thoughts crossed her mind. Now she really was remembering. Cloud could tell. She was becoming more and more an open book to him. In a lot of ways she was like him. She was like Zack. He wondered if somehow she and he were too similar to have ever made it as a couple. But then, he and Tifa were also too similar in their own way.

Aerith and Cloud searched for almost a hour. Tifa and Yuffie joined in.

"It's not here," Aerith finally proclaimed. "The Black Materia. It's not here."

"Then where is it?" Cloud said.

Tifa's eyes narrowed. "Think about it. Lucrecia must have taken it."

"But where did she take it?" Yuffie said.

"How did Hojo get all of Gast's records?" Tifa said.

Cloud and Aerith turned to each other, startled by the obvious they had failed to notice. "Lucrecia gave them to him."

Aerith sat on a piece of icy lumber. "Hojo had it. It was in Nibelheim all along. It was right in front of our faces. We could have walked across the room and taken it."

Tifa shifted her weight. "Aerith?"

"I felt it. I sensed it. It was in the basement of ShinraMansion. He took it out of the storage compartment with the last of my father's tapes. I couldn't really pin down the feeling, but I was overwhelmed by this dark, evil feeling when he opened it up. It reminded me of Sephiroth or Jenova. I sensed it but then… it was like it disappeared. I think… I think he may have taken it with him. I just tried to tell myself it had been nothing, and can't explain why I never sensed it again, but… that has to be it. Hojo has it."

Cloud turned to Cait Sith. "Where's Hojo now?"

"Junon," Cait Sith said. "Now… Cloud… Remember, I don't know everything, but last I heard, they strip-searched him and didn't find anything. But listen to this, there was something really, really freaky weird about him…"

Yuffie stammered something from behind. Her voice was guttural and soft in a way her voice was usually not. Cloud turned.

Yuffie stood limp. The light of life faded from her eyes. Only the Murasame through her back and abdomen kept her standing.

Sephiroth smirked. He twisted his blade. Yuffie slumped to one knee and then fell face-first into the snow, her mouth agape. The blood came in spurts, staining the snow pink at first and then as it saturated the ground, a bright crimson.

Yuffie blinked once and then never blinked again.

She was their friend. She was their companion. They had been together for years. There was no time to mourn. Sephiroth was upon them. The admiration he once had for the SOLDIER First Class had long-since faded to naught. Cloud drew his Buster Sword and charged. The flicker of power from within his gut coursed through his veins and seeped from his fingertips. His blade glowed and pulsed with pale blue power. Sephiroth stood still, smirking in silence. Cloud's blade slashed out. Sephiroth's eyes flashed at the last moment with something like surprise. The impact of Cloud's blade against his own jolted him backwards.

The son of a bitch deserved a nasty surprise.

Sephiroth's eyes narrowed in a scowl. His single black wing fluttered. "By now you should know your place, Cloud…" He repelled Cloud back a dozen paces.

Cloud charged again. He alternated between screams of rage and inhalation of prickly cold snow and air.

He was fast. He was so fast Cloud could barely perceive the motion. He could only feel the pain after the Murasame pierced between his ribs.

Tifa and Aerith cried out. He was peripherally aware of their voices. He could only glance over a shoulder to see them rushing towards him.

"You should know your place…" Sephiroth whispered into his ear.

Sephiroth cast him aside. Cloud tumbled into ancient lumber that crumbled to icy powder upon impact. The pain was secondary to the numb realization that Sephiroth had probably punctured something important.

Aerith looked away from Cloud, shocked. She sealed her eyes; focused on the materia in her hands. She crackled with energy. Sephiroth anticipated her and moved too fast in any case. He ran and then flew, covering the space between them in fractions of a second. He was about to impale her with the Murasame when Tifa slammed hard against his side.

Aerith stopped the spell and froze. Tifa and Sephiroth were a tangled mass of limbs. He was stunned but unharmed. He tossed her aside and brought down the Murasame to strike. Aerith and Cait Sith cried out in unison.

Tifa clapped her hands on either side of the sword, stopping it centimeters away and tried to wriggle away. The blade pressed closer and closer to her throat. Blood began to trickle down her palms.

Cloud willed himself to move. He would never know how he did it: only if he could not, then he was nothing.

Sephiroth pressed down on the blade, forcing it closer to Tifa. He was unaware of Cloud's presence until the moment after the Buster Sword severed his spine.

The Murasame fell away. He sank to the cold ground and rolled onto his back.

Tifa rolled out from under and slumped, panting in the snow.

Cloud looked Sephiroth in the eye—in the pale green cat-slit eye. Sephiroth watched him with what may have been anger, but was more likely resentment.

"I see relief," Sephiroth whispered. "I see relief, but it is misplaced, Cloud. Because…"

Cloud brought the blade down across his neck.

AVALANCHE's other survivors looked away.

Aerith ran to Tifa and fell by her side, sobbing. Even Cait startled to waddle towards her.

Cloud stood frozen, barely aware of their relief: too focused on the swarm of thoughts buzzing through his brain and the solitary voice: somehow equal-parts alien and familiar:

"_Because, Cloud. You are just a puppet._"

Cloud stood after what seemed to be a lifetime. And yet, no time must have passed. Tifa and Aerith still lay in the snow, holding each other. Cait Sith rushed past, screaming, "Tifa!"

Cloud lifted the still-bloodied Buster Sword and pierced the mechanical marionette clean through to the ice, splitting it asunder.

He approached one step at a time almost as though a child learning to walk; familiarizing himself with his own skin.

Aerith looked up, alarmed. She twisted to see him advance and stood. She had felt the screams of a hundred generations in his mind. Now she saw the single black-feathered wing unfurl from his back.

"Tifa…" Aerith began, but would not finish.

Cloud stabbed her clean through the abdomen.

Tifa bolted upright. "Cloud!"

Cloud looked into Aerith's eyes: hazy green eyes singularly like _their_ old eyes. In them, he saw reflected his own new cat-slit eyes. The part of his mind that was not his own reached out to grasp the materia from her breast. He snatched it away as she watched, frozen in shock.

And then Cloud smashed the White Materia into a thousand shards

Tifa rushed at him. Aerith slid off and away from his blade. He intercepted Tifa and caught her as gracefully as a dancer caught his partner, spiriting her off and away in manic swirls and twirls. Then they were airborne. Aerith reached out to them, dying, but she was of no concern. Cloud spiraled and swirled, plunged headlong into the ice until it yielded to sea, and then a moat of the purest green.

Tifa screamed until her vocal chords vanished into ether.

* * *

_A/N: Insert Disc 2_


	21. Chapter 21: The Forgotten Capital

**21**

**The Forgotten Capital**

Aerith lay paralyzed in the cold, crimson snow—the smoldering ruins of her parents home to one side; to the other: Yuffie's shredded husk. The body still leeched blood, but it was only an empty hull. Her soul had already left. A few feet further away laid the remains of General Sephiroth. He fared no better than Yuffie. Aerith had come all the way to the place of her birth to die alone.

The snow picked up. It would be dark soon. She heard a faint howl in the distance. Cloud had been right about the animals. Zack liked to keep work and pleasure separate, but every now and again after two or three drinks, he would let something horrible slip from his lips. She had heard a few harrowing tales of survival: she who always thought she was so experienced and worldly, having been raised in the biggest and most prosperous city of the world. The cocky country boy who fell through her cathedral roof into her flower bed had seemed so provincial at first. She was humbled to discover it had been the other way around.

He taught her how to say no to her mother. How to drink. How to make money from a bed of flowers. How to pleasure a man. He had been her one true love. Her first and only lover.

Well…

The howl repeated. Was it closer?

A fact Aerith had picked up from one of Zack's horrible stories: stomach wounds hurt like hell—she could attest to that well enough now—but they were seldom fatal. Certainly one could die from the blood loss. It might take hours or even days, however. Aerith knew the numbing and prickling across her body was not the simple result of shock. The temperature would drop well below zero tonight. Out in the open, bleeding steadily next to Yuffie's corpse and the shattered remnants of Cait Sith, Aerith literally could not move to save her life. The wound was bad, but her foremost concerns were exposure and howling things.

Once she resigned herself to her own death, the true horror crept in.

Tifa was gone. For the first time since their meeting, Aerith could not sense her presence. Maybe somewhere in the world she was faring worse than Aerith.

The tears froze to her cheek.

The winters in Midgar were mild. The heat from the mako reactors kept the snow from accumulating. Before coming so far north, the last real snow she saw accumulated the day Zack died. Long before she got the call from Zack's mother, she knew when it happened. She knew the lifeforce of Midgar mourned for her. It was so cold, its tears froze on their way to the Earth.

She concentrated on the powerful magic within her soul. She could heal herself. She had done it countless times before to others. And yet, she remained bleeding and incapacitated. Rarely before had she been unable to heal. When the Turks shot Barret on the Big Whale, she tried, but when she connected to his heart, it repelled her. In that moment, he did not want to live. He rejected the Lifestream.

Now Aerith guesed she had the opposite problem. Would the Earth heal her? No. She could feel the slow, steady draw of its aether, beckoning her deeper into its womb as the bandersnatches neared. It yearned for her companionship. It wanted her.

It did not care that Aerith wanted desperately not to die. She loved life too much. Still, it tugged. It whispered to her in words too soft to hear; in a language she could not quite understand.

Then Aerith saw the human form emerge from the haze of winter. Even in her half-dead delirium, she recognized something about the blaze of mako within. He was tall and broad-shouldered; even moreso than she had remembered. Under his hood, she saw spikes of sleek black hair.

"Zack?" Aerith whispered.

He walked closer, faster. He glanced at Yuffie; studied her cadaver for all of three seconds. He did the same for Sephiroth, but afforded him another second or two. Then his irridescent mako-blue eyes turned to Aerith.

"Why?" Aerith whispered. "Why did you leave me?"

Then he was upon her. He knelt at her side and pressed a warm ear to her chest. "This is bad." She could not clearly see his face, but even before he said, "You're Aerith Gainsborough," she knew she did not know him. All she did know was he was not Zack. Zack would never visit her again. She of all people should have known that suicide was the ultimate embrace of loneliness.

He hoisted her over his broad, powerful shoulders and carried her. _I'm bleeding all over him,_ she thought, embarassed. Then she passed out.

* * *

Aerith's eyes fluttered open to focus on a familiar ceiling. From where she had seen it before, she had no recollection, but its checkered steel panels brought back creeping, sickly feelings from somewhere deep in the recesses of her heart. A half-open door was to her right. Beyond it: a long, dark hallway. Somehow, she was surprised the room was not a locked cell.

She tried to sit upright and nearly passed out. She felt weightless and heady. Her connection to the lifestream was garbled. It took several moments to regain her sense of place in the world.

It was a dim, cold concrete room with little more than her bed: a stripped-down hospital bed at its center. She lay in it wearing only a hospital gown, of all things. A half-drunk glass of water was at the foot of the bed. Against the far wall by a tinted window rested the long, curved sword that once belonged to Sephiroth. A strange, chaotic energy lingered in its steel. Assuming the SOLDIER who saved her left his body in Icycle Inn, that sword was all that remained of him.

_What day is it?_ She tried to sit upright again. Whether it was over half an hour or three hours, her senses returned while Aerith stared at the ceiling. That was not a good thing. When she was finally able to feel anything at all, she felt the most intense pain of her life. Her abdomen pulsed with a throbbing fire that spread through most of her right torso in jolts. The wound was closed. The scar would stay with her for the remainder of her life.

Aerith thought of Tifa. Then she thought of Yuffie. Then she thought of Cait Sith and Cloud. Then she realized she was alone. All alone. For all of thirty seconds, she thought they had finally stopped Jenova. And then Cloud…

"Soup and diluted honey," a voice called from down the hall. "The same thing for five days."

"She isn't in a position to complain, Hollander," said another.

Aerith perked up and watched the door.

"It was reckless of you to leave," said the first voice.  
"What would you have me do?" said the second. "It's not like we had much choice. We've got to eat. One extra mouth is little concern. You're the one who told me how important it was she be kept alive."

"She's important. I just know it. I have to believe it after…"

"I know you and Gast were close, but…"

"Not, him you dolt. Her. I held her in the highest esteem."

"You mean…"

"She was far too good for him. That pompous egg-head. I had half a mind to tear his heart out when I found out what he did to her. With child in such a godless place…"

"What are you talking about?"

"She could have made something of herself. Gast always fancied himself a man of letters. If she had applied herself, she could have been twice the man as he. She deserved better than to live on as a glorified lab rat."

"Well…" The black-haired man who rescued her emerged from the doorway. Aerith sat upright. Zack spoke in awe of Angeal Hewley. She never thought she would meet him in person. His eyes widened, surprised.

A brown-bearded man approached behind Angeal. He did not appear as startled. "Are you well, Aerith?"

Aerith protectively pulled the sheets around her torso. "How do you know who I am?"

He narrowed his eyes. "We talked for the better part of an hour last night. Don't you remember?"

Aerith shook her head.

He frowned. "No? You were a bit delirious."

Aerith swallowed. "What was I saying?"

"All sorts of things. I suppose it's true the White Materia's lost?"

Aerith nodded.

The bearded man grimaced. "As I feared. My hypothesis may be correct. JENOVA can travel from one host to another freely. It wasn't just a fluke with Sephiroth." He gave Angeal a grim look. Angeal nodded, expressionless.

Aerith relaxed. Her sheets slid to her waist. "Excuse me… but… who are you?"

He approached. "Call me Hollander. We've met before, Aerith."

Aerith's eyes widened and her recollection of this place dawned on her. She nearly jumped out of bed. "Oh, shit."

"You're safe, Aerith,"Angeal said.

Memories of bleached floors and I.V. needles and days of quarantine without human contact rushed her senses. This was the dark, creeping place in the shadow of her memory. It was where she came from before foster care in Midgar; where she escaped to; where she was kidnapped to after the destruction of Icycle Inn. He was the man looming over her: poking, proding, and experimenting. She stifled a scream.

"Aerith, listen to me…" Hollander said.

Her heart pounded in her chest. "Get out. Get away from me."

He raised his hands, as though to calm. "Aerith, I never meant to hurt you. I didn't know what had happened. I thought of Gast and his pet Cetra. I had no idea…"

"Get out!" Aerith shrieked.

"Aerith…"

Angeal's voice reverberated against the walls. "Dr. Hollander, leave. Now."

He gave Angeal a sidelong glance and turned to depart.

Aerith wiped away fresh tears. When Dr. Hollander's footsteps dissipated, she spoke. "Why? What is he doing here?"

"We have nothing in common but a mistrust of Shinra."

"He's a monster. When I was a child, he…"

"I know what he is, Aerith. I have no illusions about that. But I swear. No harm shall come to you. Otherwise Zack would give me hell in the afterlife."

Aerith sniffled. "Where am I?"

"Modeoheim."

Aerith's mind searched for the right words. "We arrived through Modeoheim."

"Not the city proper. This is a Shinra research facility a few miles out from the outskirts."

"What am I doing here? I should be dead."

"I saw the steam in the distance when the snow melted. I thought it odd and followed. It took all of our healing materia to fend off the gangrene. You just might be the luckiest woman in all of Gaia."

Aerith lay prone in the bed. Her abdomen throbbed and she remembered the stink of Yuffie and Sephiroth's seeping fluids. She cast her eyes again to Sephiroth's sword. She did not feel especially lucky. "How did you know who I was at Icycle Inn?"

"Are you kidding? Zack must have shown me your picture half a hundred times. You're even more striking in person."

Aerith flushed. "He talked about you a lot. It hurt him when you left."

"It was hard. SOLDIER was all I'd ever known. It was all I ever really was." He rested against the wall. His form was broad and powerful. Still, she recognized the start of weight gain in the wrong places. She could only imagine how he looked in his prime.

"You have the same eyes." But they were so much sadder.

He gazed at her. "Is that so? I look into yours and I see something of Sephiroth's."

A throat cleared in the hallway. "Am I interrupting anything, Angeal?"

Angeal glared. "Will you at least make yourself useful and bring us some goddamn tea?"

Hollander scampered away.

Aerith sat upright.

"Don't try to move," Angeal whispered.

Aerith lay back down in bed. "Cloud. Yuffie. Tifa. Everyone…"

"Don't try to think."

It was the best advice Aerith had heard in ages. Within half an hour, she slipped into a long, dreamless sleep.

* * *

By the fourth day, Aerith was almost comfortable around both men—not to say she liked Dr. Hollander much more than she did upon awakening, but she had no more concerns for her safety. He was no boogey-man, she realized. Just a burnt out old man. Angeal had come to regard her with a peculiar gentleness, all the more welcome as she came to feel less and less frail.

"We went to the academy together," Hollander explained over a dinner of some grilled meat. Aerith could not tell exactly what it was: only that it was something Angeal had killed—brutally. The carcass had not been a pretty sight. The mess hall was dark. It had high windows that let in little light and the three fed by a pair of electric lanterns. Aerith had been well enough to join them at the table for two days. "Gast, Hojo, and I," Hollander began.

"So you were friends with Hojo for some time," Aerith suggested.

Hollander chuckled. "I would hardly call us 'friends.' We spent most of our waking hours together, for sure. We socialized with few others, in fact."

Aerith blinked. "But… you weren't friends?"

"Hojo took nothing seriously. He was ever the clown even in those days. And Gast, he could never see the joke in anything. No humor at all. No. They were not my friends. But I acknowledged them as my intellectual equals. There are few for whom I can do that."

Angeal glanced at Aerith and rolled his eyes.

Hollander did not notice. "Gast and Hojo hated each other, but beneath that hatred lay a foundation of deep respect. I've been meaning to ask you, Ms. Gainsborough, how was my dear Professor Hojo during your travels?"

"As nutty as a rabid squirrel."

Hollander seemed amused. "The line between genius and madness is paper-thin." He took another bite. "In the academy, we had in common a fascination with the Lifestream and mako."

"So you knew mako comes from the Lifestream?" Aerith asked.

"It's been well known in scholarly circles for a while that mako is just a particular physical manifestation of the Lifestream."

"How did Shinra keep it secret for so long?" Aerith asked.

"It was never really a secret. They just own every half-decent scientist and research facility in the world. Who else would know? When was the last time you saw a newspaper headline about an article published in the scholarly journal, _Natural Science Review Quarterly_?"

Aerith gave him an incredulous stare. Something about Hollander did not fit, but she could not quite place it. "This never bothered you? It never worried you?"

"You have to understand. Though it was known mako flowed from the Lifestream, it was always assumed it was a self-refilling reservoir of energy. We never thought we were really and truly depleting it."

Aerith nodded. It was a half-truth. Maybe they told themselves that so they might work on in willful ignorance. He had been a concerned scientist so long as that concern had not threatened his livelihood. Aerith gleaned as much from Hollander's mind, but did not say so. _Maybe my father was like that too._

"Shinra had been tapping mako for electricity for generations. Over time, it became a victim of its own success. You can only saturate a market but so far before a corporation has nowhere to grow. And a corporation must grow. It becomes a beast and a beast that must be fed. Tell me, Aerith. What do you do when the entire population of the world consumes your service?"

It was Angeal who answered. "Well, for one thing, you ensure they keep utilizing your service. By any means necessary."

Aerith got his meaning. "The Wutai uprising."

Hollander shrugged. "A good point. Not what I was referring to, but yes. The answer I was looking for was this: you must expand into a new market. You must sell a new product. They marketed appliances optimized for Mako power. They created the television and radio stations that could be viewed and heard with their technology. They used their media outlets to stifle any glimmer of competition. Shinra sponsored theaters and operated vineyards. In the process, they bought up the real-estate of entire towns. Public Safety began as a Shinra subsidiary: a private security firm to police Shinra's proprieties. It is, today, effectively the world's police force because Gaia herself has become one big Shinra propriety. What product next? Governance. Now all of the world's people pay taxes to Shinra for the services, utilities, and bureacracies of legislature. Shinra has spread its fingerprints across the entire globe and has taken fledgeling steps into aerospace. They have, almost literally, outgrown the planet.

"By the time Gast, Hojo, and I came around, there was little need to refine the process of mako power. The former president Shinra understood that what Shinra really 'sold' was world governance. As part of that, he had an ambitious new vision for Public Safety. Ever an astute entrepeneuer, it created a new use for an existing resource. Mako for military use."

"SOLDIER," Angeal said.

Hollander nodded. "It was quite ingenious, really. Remember, we all thought mako was a limitless source of power. He sought to cement Shinra's grasp on world hegemony by forging the greatest fighting force the world had ever known. It was one no one could even think about replicating because it relied entirely on a Shinra-patented technology. It was genius, really.

"Some forty years ago, Hojo, Gast, and I received a grant from Balam University and co-authored a study on the effects of mako radiation exposure on athletes. It's been known for some time that some long-time employees at mako plants enjoy greater longevity and greater resitance to illnesss."

Aerith remembered Tellah and Barret's reminiscence of North Corel. "And some go crazy."

Hollander dismissed her with a wave. "Beyond the scope of our research at the time. Though, you are correct. No, we were only investigating very small doses of indirect exposure. Nothing on the scale of the mako baths modern SOLDIERS are exposed to for hours at a time over many months. Our research was the first of its kind. We found even mild doses of mako produced statistically significant performance increases in simple motor tasks. The side effects at that level were negligible.

"After we published our findings, we were immediately offered residency in the Midgar headquarters of the Science Research Division. Believe it or not, it had never occurred to Shinra to expose someone to mako on purpose. Hojo and I were assigned to Project Gilgamesh. Our goal: to create a modern supersoldier. Over a few very short years, we pushed the science as far as we could. We discovered some candidates could withstand tremendous doses of mako to the point where their strength and stamina became superhuman. Of course, we had a number of… failed subjects. It was then we discovered candidates required, above all else, uncommon psychological toughness. Otherwise, the mako would drive them mad."

"Why?" Aerith asked.

Hollander hesitated. "The neurological mechanism through which many candidates experience psychosis was never discovered." Aerith could tell he was a man who was not used to admitting, "I don't know."

"Genesis discovered it," Angeal said.

This irked Hollander. He slammed his cup on the table after a gulp of coffee. "Speculation. Genesis was my crown jewel. I picked him from the finest genetic stock and exposed him to mako in utero. He was literally born to be a SOLDIER. He was flawless."

"He was born with pieces missing, Hollander," Angeal said. "I knew him better than anyone but Sephiroth."

"And look what good Hojo's little pet SOLDIER has done. If the mako caused an ounce of disquiet in Genesis' mind, then Sephiroth's Cetra blood should have caused a pound."

Aerith's patience waned. "What about my father?"

Hollander once again seemed disinterested in her question. "Gast did not accept the job as part of Project Gilgamesh. Really, SOLDIER was my brainchild. Hojo was instrumental in its foundation, but like Gast, his interests were more eclectic; his attention span more flighty. He and Hojo used a Shinra grant to set up a research facility in the Forgotten Capital."

Aerith's eyes narrowed. "The what?"

"The Forgotten Capital," Hollander said. "East of here on the Northern Continent. It's one of the world's oldest Cetra ruins. It's peppered by natural springs. They never did fully explore the network of subterranean canals, but beneath them were natural outlets to mako flow. Gast and Hojo thought studying the site might lead to understanding the fundamental nature of the Lifestream. They thought the mako flow would lead to the core of the Lifestream itself. But nothing really worked out from the start. If it truly is the Lifestream, they had no way of actually exploring it. Nothing can withstand too long of an exposure in mako of the concentration there. The research site eventually closed. Suffice it to say, their grandest endeavors were fruitless. There was one unexpected payoff, though. Amongst the tribal Northmen, they found their very own long-thought extinct, living, breathing, Cetra."

Aerith was no longer eating—only listening to Hollander. "And that was my mother, Ifalna, wasn't it?"

Hollander nodded. "They tried to keep her a secret as best they could, but it had to have been the worst-kept secret on all of Gaia. I met her once. They introduced her to me as she was: one of the last Cetra. Gast was infatuated. That much was obvious. I consider myself more jaded. Ifalna struck me as a woman like most others with her feminine whims and flights of fancy.

Aerith remembered the words of her other mother, Elmyra. _If you can't say something nice…_

"…But what an intellect. Like the Northmen among whom she lived, she lacked much formal education. She could have far exceded Gast in accomplishment if that weren't the case. She was observant and kind. And for whatever reason, she was quite taken with our dearly-departed professor."

"You mean my father," Aerith said.

"Well yes, he would be, now wouldn't he?"

"What happened to them?"

"Eventually, Scince Research saw fit to collect on Gast's pet Cetra. She was too valuable an asset, it was decided, to not be studed in a more formal way. She was Gast's personal curiosty. Once they were married, one could understandably doubt his objectivity. But don't you think something was odd?"

"What?" Aerith said.

Hollander smirked. "Hojo was head of Science Research at the time. And he was involved with a Cetra of his very own. Only he never advertised her as such. He told only me of Lucrecia's heritage. Only me because he knew I would never tell a soul. Only me because he wanted to boast about his trophy and his accomplishment: his child with Lucrecia. It was a human-Cetra hybrid infused by Shinra with the power of mako. And yet, why tell no one else of his accomplishment? And why demand that Ifalna be captured like some common lab animal?"

"What do you know about Lucrecia?"

"That she was a Cetra. According to Hojo. And that's it. Curious, don't you think?"

Aerith stoped to reflect. "Why order my mother captured… it wasn't about her. Not really. He knew all along my mother had the Black and White Materia. He wanted them and trying to take her was just a pretext."

Hollander shook his head. "I don't even think it was about the materia. It was about you."

Aerith quirked her head. "What?"

"One moment…" Hollander stood and strode down the hall.

Aerith an Angeal exchanged glances.

Hollander returned a moment later with a tattered fragment of paper: equal parts burnt and soaked, and all-but illegible.

Aerith gave him a quizzical look.

"A Shinra patrol found you cold, alone, and near death near the ruins of Icycle Inn. Only I knew you for what you were. You have your mother's eyes."

"That's what I'm told." Aerith remembered her conversation with Vincent in the Gold Saucer. She did not trust Hollander enough to reveal another living Cetra.

"I thought it best to follow Hojo's example and I told no one what you were," Hollander said. "Which worked to my detriment. I learned before Hojo it's unwise to keep too much from Shinra. They gave us incredible free-reign to do our research, but it had its limits. But by then, I was concerned about Hojo's intentions. I knew he and this 'Lucrecia' were important. And I knew right away you were important."

Aerith narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

Hollander handed Aerith the paper. "There wasn't much left in the ruins of Icycle Inn. I procured this from Gast's home and managed to keep it to myself. It's a letter in Ifalna's hand."

Aerith read. It was mostly illegible if not for one passage spared from stains of fire and ice:

_Our daughter's special. You know that as well as I. But when the darkness falls, I believe she will hold the key. She was wrought of our love, and what other than love can cure the world's madness?_

Aerith absorbed the words over the period of a minute, rereading the cryptic, context-less words again and again. She looked up to see Hollander gauging her reaction.

"What does this mean?" she asked.

Hollander's excitement became palpable. "That it all makes sense now. Sephiroth was part of Hojo's plans from the beginning. He knew all about Nibelheim. When he sired Sephiroth, he did so planning to create a bridge to Jenova and Omega Weapon. Only he never expected there to be another half-Cetra. You were Sephiroth's opposite. That's why he tried to have your parents killed. He needed the materia, but he also feared you. You, Aerith."

Aerith frowned. For all her fear of him, she could finally see him for what he really was, and it was not what Angeal saw him for. He was just another man imagining her as something she was not. "I doubt that," she said. Sepiroth had certainy never seemed afraid of her. But connected somehow… maybe. Then she remembered the enormous sword still at rest in her bedroom. "He's dead now anway."

"A piece of him lives on in Cloud," Angeal said. "Just as a piece of Genesis lived on in Sephiroth. So now you too are connected to Cloud."

Aerith studied Angeal carefully. He said it with such confidence. "How would he even know…?" Then it occurred to her. As she was connected to the Planet through the Lifestream, they were connected in their own way too. All of them. The Lifestream flowed through their veins as well.

Angeal sat with the stone silence of a condemned man who had resolved to carry his final confession to the grave.

"The White Materia's gone," Aerith said, half-reminding herself. "Cloud destroyed it. If Omega Weapon is ever activated then it can't be de-activated."

"Then you need to stop Cloud before he can find Holy," Hollander said.

Words caught in Aerith's throat. "Me? Did you just say 'me?'"

Holander blinked. "Well… yes."

Aerith set her fork down and stood. "I'm not some heroic… person. That was Zack. And Cloud. And Tifa. I don't know how many times I have to tell people before they believe me: I'm just an ordinary girl."

"Zack was my friend," Angeal said. "He could have had any girlfriend he ever wanted. He would never pick someone who was just 'ordinary.'"

"Well, I loved Zack, but I couldn't tell you why he fell in love with me. I'm just a flower girl from the slums of Midgar. I never lived a day away from home until Shinra kidnapped me and I never left Midgar until AVALANCHE took me. Someone else has got to be up for the task of killing some ancient Cetra demi-god in the body of one of my friends." Her lip quivered.

Angeal did not respond immediately. "I lived in Midgar for a few years, you know. I know nothing grows in the lower plates. Maybe the heroes have had their turn. Maybe instead we need a girl who can make flowers bloom in the slums."

Heat rose to Aerith's face. "I need to think. Goodnight." Though she said "Goodnight," it was not even dusk outside. She left the table hungry, but unable to eat for the queasiness. She locked herself in her room, unable even to do much thinking. All she could see were cat-slit eyes of Mako blue. She imagined them on Zack. Even well into the night, even after crying until Hollander and Angeal were peacefully at rest, she laid with the terrible thought.

* * *

When Aerith finally slept, she saw a cabin in the forest. It was a deep forest, bright from the morning gleam of sunshine on dew drops which could have been the sparkling lifeforce of a hundred thousand souls. Sprawling hairline trails vanished into infinite veins.

The woman rocked in her rocking chair, staring not at the man, but through him. Her long chestnut hair half-veiled her face. Aerith was right in front of her, but she could not see. Then again, she did not look.

Wood split with resounding _thwacks_. He was not as Aerith remembered him. Maybe it was he as he would have been had he grown up in an intact Nibelheim: a collected, strong man of the country, dressed in mottled jeans and boots. He set down the splitter. His head quirked and he turned. Through locks of gold, the eyes of a SOLDIER possessed _saw_.

Aerith awoke, covered in sweat and naked fear.

It was dawn. Not five minutes passed before Angeal approached. "What's wrong? Aerith?"

Aerith closed her eyes. She knew that place. She had never seen it before in her life, and yet she _knew_. "Take me to the Forgotten Capital."

He stared as though he had not heard.

"I need you and Hollander to take me to the Forgotten Capital. Hollander said the springs there have outlets to the Lifestream."

"Right… that was your father's theory. But all they ever found out for sure was there was a lot of exposed mako. What would you possibly want there?"

"I need to see it. I need to know what it's like. I need to find…" _Tifa._ "I need to start somewhere if you want me to find Cloud."

Angeal paled. "I'll tell Hollander."

* * *

They passed the frozen tundra through thawed trails after the Shinra-made roads dead-ended. And then, after four hours, the buildings that did not look like buildings at all emerged from the primordial forest. The trees hummed with life in a way no trees Aerith had ever seen before had. They regarded her with a strange curiosity and tried to communicate, but in a dead language too ancient and obscure for her to comprehend. This long-forgotten place was old and senile. It was its prerogative to regard her and the rest of humanity with disinterest and disdain. Nowhere before had Aerith felt so alone. So strangely human.

There was no sunlight in this place. It was as black as night, though it could not have been much past noon. How the trees survived, Aerith did not know, but then, the trees had no leaves. They pulsated with iridescent, inner light: spindly beams of white marine neon. They were alive, but this was not life as Aerith knew it.

Angeal's truck stopped by one such tree and the three of them exited: Aerith emerged from the extended cab in back. Brambly shrubs prickled her toes.

"What is this place?" Aerith asked.

"We told you," Hollander said. "This is the Forgotten Capital."

Aerith realized he did not know what she meant. He saw only dead shrubs and glowing trees. Of the three of them, she realized only she could see it for what it truly was. This place looked dead, but the air was thick with life—pure life bereft of form and mass.

A pond before them shimmered with pulsating light. Beyond it lay what may have been a man-made structure, but could have just as easily been a massive, beached conch shell, bleached in nonexistent sunlight.

Aerith felt a shiver. It was as though someone had just walked over her grave.

Maybe that someone was _her_.

"The Cetra lived here," Aerith said, barely above a whisper.

Hollander examined one of the shrubs at his feet. "Yes. A long time ago. It's thought the first Cetra civilization originated from not far from here. Lucrecia and Ifalna lived here with others, for a time. Ifalna said they all died out over the course of years."

"What's in the buildings?"

Hollander shrugged. He had been willing to humor her whim. He believed in her, but he doubted the sense of this expedition. "You can look if you like. They're husks. Only the structure remains. Treasure hunters and archaeologists have pilfered all of the major artifacts. Now there's nothing here. This was where the last of the Cetra congregated before their extinction. All it is is a graveyard."

Aerith remembered Vincent again. They were not extinct. There was Vincent. There was Sephiroth, but no more. Now Aerith would discover whether or not they lived on in _her_.

She took one tentative step into the water. To her right, Angeal and Hollander tensed. She was barely aware of their reactions. The warm, tingling energy crept across her skin from toe to ankle. Unconsciously, she stepped deeper until it bathed her up to her knees.

It was true. This place fed straight to the Lifestream. Aerith peeled past the old, forgotten, hull of this place to the fleshy core. Voices encircled her and beckoned her more loudly than ever before in her life.

They wailed. They wailed with the sorrow of a parent whose children were not only dead, but had killed each other.

Amidst the tingling ebb and flow of intangible power, Aerith felt the very real tickle of something soft and wet brush her leg. She glanced down. The black miniskirt bubbled up from the depths and drew nearer to her.

Aerith felt her heart clench. After year, she was tired of bearing unsaid words.

"She's in there," Aerith said. "I know it. She has to be…"

"Careful, Aerith," Angeal said.

"The rocks aren't very even," Hollander said. "No one who sinks into these springs ever comes back."

Aerith remembered another hard-learned lesson from her mother. Her real mother. The one who was waiting for her someday in Midgar, hopefully alive and well.

A girl had to risk sinking if she ever wanted to swim.

Aerith undid the ribbon in her hair and light auburn locks cascaded free.

They cried after her, but she ignored them. The time to talk had passed.

It was time to dive.

* * *

_A/N: Sorry for the late update. As I mentioned on my profile page, the East Coast storm system fried our old computer. It was a good lesson in remembering to back up my documents. From here on out, I'm hoping to resume the once-a-month posting schedule. Thanks for bearing with me and continuing to keep up with the story!_


	22. Chapter 22: Traversing the Planet

**22**

**Traversing the Planet**

First was only darkness.

Loneliness.

No sunlight would touch this place—this inner world bereft of sun.

But then there was light. It was an impossible light and she had no right seeing it for she had become like this place: without true form and without shape. She realized only after it was of her creation. It was there for her and because of her.

Through the light she saw translucent hands become whole. She willed them into complete being. She imagined feet to walk and they were there. Then she imagined a ground to walk on and she walked.

A subterranean world emerged and it was her creation. It was somehow exactly as she had always imagined it would be.

She had power here.

"Hello?" she called and there was an echo. It made sense to her there would be an echo. "Is anybody here?"

No one answered. Could anyone even answer? Did souls linger? Or was she the only flicker of consciousness in a homogenous pool of being?

She began to walk. She somehow understood she did not have to walk. This place was not "real" in the sense she understood. She was not even "real" anymore. Her body had dissolved into the great Everything. She knew, to a point, the difference between her and anything else was gone. Size, mass, and place meant nothing. Still, what more could she do than walk knowing in this place of sameness, she had to move?

She walked for what could have been a hundred feet or could have been a thousand kilometers. She seemed to move and that mattered. The road (and it was a road she walked) became more descript. They had not been there before, Aerith was pretty sure, but she noticed cobblestone roads at her feet. They were much like the ill-maintained roads of Sector Five. Aerith realized this was a road she had walked down many times before.

The deserted tank was new.

Aerith scanned her street. The home of her youth still sat shattered by heavy munition. It had not changed at all since Yuffie blew it up. On second glance, Aerith realized it had changed after all. The smoke was cleared. Brambled weeds crept through decrepid brick. Aerith peered inside. It was as though she were looking into her cathedral garden. Lilies like golden sunbeams covered the floor.

What state was her home in now? Was it even standing? What had become of her poor flowers?

It occurred to Aerith this was her inner world at present. It could have used a little love.

Love.

There was nothing for her in this place. She was looking for someone. But who? Maybe it had to do with floating through the Lifestream. It had always beckoned her and now she swam in it. Metaphorically speaking. It would have felt oddly normal if she were not so disoriented. She had no sense of place. The part of her brain that atuned to the Lifestream was dysfunctional—a compass at Magnetic North.

Right. She had to find someone. But who?

She walked again. She had to find Someone.

The tattered remnants of her home in the slums vanished out of being. She was in a village. It was a village the likes of which she had never seen before. At least she had never seen anything like it in person. She had seen this place on television. There was no place in the world like Mount Da Chao and its building-sized sculptures.

She was approaching Wutai Village. Only it wasn't the real Wutai Village. There was no one here, or nearly so. It was like her Sector Five: a village of one.

It took a long time to search. At least it felt like a long time, though no time may have passed at all. She finally found the dreamscape's one resident in a small house at the core of the town surrounded by paper screen doors. She had never seen them before in her life. Seeing as how none of this was real, she wondered if she could someday see them yet.

She sat in the middle on a tatami mat at the center of the room. She stared not at the wall but cleanly through it.

"Yuffie?" Aerith approached.

Yuffie neither turned nor acknowledged her.

"Yuffie?" Is that you?

She blinked, almost hearing… but not.

Aerith's lower lip tightened. "I'm so sorry. It was because of me we were there. It was me he was looking for. It was because of me he found us and he…"

Yuffie half-turned, looked at her, but did not see her. Aerith was the only specter in this place of ghosts.

Aerith moved to embrace her. She needed help. She needed help finding…

Who was she looking for again?

"_Leave her._"

Aerith stood. She could not look him in the face. Not like this. Not now.

"She does not know she is dead yet. That will be remedied in time."

Aerith felt nonexistent blood boil. "Is that why you're here? To finish the job you started?" She finally turned.

His green eyes looked dead, but then, no moreso than when he lived. "No," Sephiroth Crescent said. "I have come here for you."

* * *

Tifa loved watching Cloud split wood. There was something so unabashedly manly about the process. It reminded her they were finally back where they were meant to be. Away from Shinra; away from terrorists. The hills of Mount Nibel always called home their own.

Just within a few miles, Tifa imagined Nibelheim was flourishing as well. This was her dream after all. Why wouldn't it be?

"What's on your mind, Tifa? You seem distracted." He stopped cutting and watched her with eyes of the coolest, most compassionate blue. Had they always been so blue? Even before SOLDIER?

Tifa tried to forget the horrible cat-slit pupils. They had not belonged to him. They could not have.

Tifa sighed. "Nothing." She started for the door. She had not been distracted. Not really. She just liked watching his work. In this dream, no one in the world existed but the two of them. It was mid-afternoon. What was she supposed to do now? They had to eat something, sometime. She had to get dinner on the table. The dead rabbit on the kitchen table seemed to smile at her. She was no stranger to this. She lived in the mountains with Zangan for years. She attributed it to being in Midgar for too long. It hardly seemed fair. This was her dream. Why could she not have edited out the bits about dead animals?

"It seems like more than 'nothing' to me," Cloud said.

Tifa scanned the kitchen. Utensils and copper pans lined the cedar walls and that was it. Tifa knew she would never again live in a house of luxury, nor would she want to do so. On the counter, no far from the dead rabbit sat a picture, but a picture of whom?

Cloud turned her. His eyes flared, but then a moment later, they were the warm, beloved eyes she had grown to love her whole life. "You haven't been the same ever since that accident."

Tifa nodded. Yes. "That accident."

What accident?

"You don't have to pretend with me," Cloud said. "You know I'll love you and take care of you no matter what. Nothing else matters to me."

Tifa felt his body press to hers. It was all so loving and tender. It was also so confusing. "Cloud… This isn't…"

"Real?" He embraced her. "If it isn't, then what is? Can there be anything more real than the sum of our hopes and fears?"

Tifa shook her head. "What is this place?"

"If you want to know if you're in heaven or hell, the answer is 'no.' It's an unending dream. And yes. It is."

"It is… It is what?"

"It really is me. The real me. And I don't care about what happened. I don't care about what happened back then."

Tifa squirmed away. There was no need for him to be so cruel if this were a dream. "What happened back then?"

"The accident."

"Cloud, what are you talking about? What accident?"

His eyes did not waver. "That night in Gold Saucer."

Oh shit. He _knew_ about that?

* * *

Aerith left Yuffie. Yuffie could not help her and Aerith knew as she was now, she could do nothing but torment her.

Steel wheels roared across their track overhead. Why did the Lifestream have a rollercoaster?

General Sephiroth watched her with fleeting glares. Still, he would not speak.

"Why did you want to see me?" she asked.

Rainbow strobe lights flashed across his silver hair. "I sensed your presence here and I needed to see for myself. Indeed, Aerith Gainsborough entered the Lifestream. So tell me. Why are you not dead?"

Aerith stiffened. "You sound disappointed."

"Do not be coy with me, girl. I came here expecting to find you the powerful specter of the most powerful race of this Earth. Not some shadow of your true potential, still tethered to a physical body."

"My body's gone."

"Surely a temporary measure. It exists in some form or another here. Did you know what happens when you disentangle the spiritual from the physical? You become liberated."

"Well… I really don't want to die."

Sephiroth shook his head. "Do you expect to approach Jenova and defeat her as a flesh and blood woman?"

"I don't know if I can or can't at this point. I just know I have to try."

"You miss my point. You are as foolish as you are naïve. You face the most powerful life force this planet has ever known. No mere human has the capacity to stop the calamity she intends to unleash."

"So what would you have me do, Sephiroth?"

"You have to become something transcendental. An immortal spirit perhaps. A metaphor perhaps. Or at the least, a symbol."

"I don't understand."

"You stand no chance as you are. I would have killed you in another instant. As long as you are unwilling to die you lack the power and resolve."

Aerith blinked. "I don't follow."

"You have to die, Aerith."

"Sephiroth, I…"

"I told you. You are supposed to die. To become everything you were meant to be, you have to die."

"Well, I refuse. And like hell you can do anything about it now."

Sephiroth frowned. More than usual.

Aerith walked and stumbled over a hollowed-out Chocobo mascot costume. "I don't like this place."

"Is it this place you do not like, or its above-ground analog?"

She scowled. She liked him more when he was a mortal threat. Now he was just an annoying puppy dog. "I always wanted to visit Gold Saucer when I was a little girl."

He eyed a dilapidated concession stand with vague disinterest. "Is that so."

"Everyone in Midgar wanted to. There were never any advertisements for it. Not in Sector Five. Sure, we saw the occasional TV spot, but that was it. No. Up on the surface, they had a big, full-sized billboard right by the theater."  
"I seem to remember."

"Do you really?"

"I too grew up in Midgar. I never had an adopted mother. I never knew my mother and I will never acknowledge Professor Hojo as my father. Shinra employees raised me apart from other children. Forgive me for being callous. I would not have even thought it possible I might one day go to the Gold Saucer." His eyes conveyed something strangely like pain.

"You've been through a lot. Haven't you?"

Sephiroth glowered. "When Jenova takes you, you lose a part of yourself. Perhaps in my case, that part is me. The me you see before you. But part of you, she seduces. There was a part of me that always wanted to watch the world burn down. That was my sin, Aerith. What was yours?"

She stood at the road to the haunted hotel. None of its ghosts were real and none could have harmed her. She knew from the carnivals that did venture close enough to visit, that you entered a haunted house to be scared by shadows. This Gold Saucer was, above all else, a world of shadows.

"Perhaps," Sephiroth said, "You expect me to pity you for being loved and being able to love."

Aerith felt tears. She wanted there to be tears. There had to be tears.

Her tears washed away the carnival.

All that remained was sparkling aether.

And Tifa's distant call.

"No," Aerith cried. "No! I don't want Tifa. I… I want to see Zack. I need to see him. Where is he?"

Sephiroth turned to her, genuinely surprised. "Angeal's Puppy Dog? Why, you will never find him in this place. A shard of him lives on in Jenova."

"And the rest?"

"…Has never once left your side. Not for as many years as he has been gone."

Sephiroth stood nose-to-nose with her.

Aerith reeled away, shocked.

He _smiled_ at her.

"You were my opposite. My counterpart. Maybe you could not defeat me, but perhaps you could save me." Sephiroth turned and walked. "Still, do not think me rude for saying you would be better off dead."

"Sephiroth," Aerith cried.

"Think. Discover the piece of Cloud Jenova was able to seduce. It should not be hard for you."

Aerith tried to speak, but her words disappeared along with her doubt and hesitation.

No. She did not save him. He saved himself in the strangest possible way. It would take her a while to feel comfortable with that or understand it.

Sephiroth vanished into a sea of the brightest, clearest green.

Now Tifa needed her.

* * *

Tifa overflowed sorrow, weeping against the counter. Cloud held her—cradled her.

"I didn't mean to," Tifa whispered.

"Aren't you listening, Tifa?" Cloud said. "I know and I don't care."

"But… She's my friend and I cared for her so much." Who was she really apologizing to?

"None of that matters to me. All that's ever mattered to me my entire life has been loving you. Without that, I'm nothing."

She looked him in the eye—really looked him in the eye. "But…"

"No buts, Tifa. Don't you see…"

How did they wind up in the bedroom?

Where were her clothes?

"Cloud, this isn't right." That was what she said. It was obvious that was not what she felt. Not as Cloud placed light-as-air kisses along her arm. He who had only really known her as a lover twice knew how to elicit this reaction from her.

Had they only made love twice? Weren't they married? Or were they only living in sin? Tifa was hazy about that part of the fantasy.

"We need to stop this," Tifa whispered.

Lips trailed across each breast—across her abdomen—across her naval. "Why?"

"Because I've been having a lot of confusing thoughts lately and…" She remembered the way his sword pierced Aerith. "I can't… you're not even real."

"Let me become real. In this place, anything's possible, my love. I could spirit you off to anywhere in the world. I could tell you the words for my whole life I've never been able to say. I could make you my queen. I could make you my Goddess. Become one with me. Let me… consume you."

Tifa gasped. His lips hovered where they had never been before.

Then he consumed her.

How long it lasted, Tifa could not tell. It turned out to be the most confused orgasm of Tifa's life. Given what had happened that night in the Gold Saucer, that was a very high bar.

That night started like so many others: a private conversation with Aerith. Venting about Cloud. They toured the Gold Saucer and retired to the bar in their inn. After the third glass of wine, Tifa caught a startling new sparkle in her eye.

After that, things got complicated.

Of all the ravenous beasts they had encountered on their journey, Tifa never thought quiet, demure Aerith Gainsborough would be the one to eat her alive.

She even did her best to hide her tears when Tifa murmered Cloud's name.

Cloud lay beside her, his body bare. He kissed her lips and tasted faintly of her.

"That was… wow…" Tifa sighed.

"Still you resist," Cloud said. He pressed against her.

Tifa gasped.

"And you're not even sated yet," Cloud said.

Tifa felt his weight shift on top of her. Cloud had never loved with such abandon. He had never spoken with such passion. As he positioned himself above her, at the cusp of her womanhood, she pushed him away.

Aerith was bleeding in the snow. Dying. Wasn't she? Or had that been years ago?

Cloud pressed a finger to her lips. "Don't think of her. Not at a time like this."

Tifa's eyes widened even as he tried to enter her.

This was not a dream. This was not even a nightmare.

Tifa shuffled to the side and wrapped herself in the stark white sheets.

The walls disinitegrated in fire.

The room vanished in Midgar Reactor One's fireball.

Cloud watched her through the fire, singed but not consumed. The world smoldered. His cat-slit eyes glowed.

Tears rolled down Tifa's cheek. "This wasn't the life I wanted. I never wanted any of it. Not any of it."

"I know," said the thing that both was and was not Cloud.

"Why? Why did you come back for me, you bastard? You brought Shinra to my doorstep. You forgot who you were. Did it ever occur to you I didn't want you to be a SOLDIER? Did it ever occur to you I might care for you just the way you were? I can never have you back now. Cloud's gone. The Cloud I grew up with is dead!"

His eyes glistened in the red gleam of flame. "No. A part of me lives on within you."

She sniffled. "What?"

"A part of me lives on inside of you. And will… for the next eight to nine months."

Tifa tumbled to the ground, or what passed for a ground.

The flames subsided. She sat by a bassinet of the purest white.

"No," she croaked. "It can't be."

"It is. Why else do you think I brought you here? Stay here. With me. We can survive this madness together. You must remain here though. Out there, nothing will suvive. Nothing."

Tifa tried to speak, but no words came.

"We will be together forever in the world we should have always had. Should you emerge after the chaos, we will live on as God and Goddess of a new world order. A world of two we may craft to our liking."

He cupped her cheek. She looked into his inhuman eyes. She felt nothing. Nothing at all. Not anymore.

"_Don't touch her._"

Cloud spun around. The bassinet dissolved in cascading green light. "You."

Aerith surfaced from a pool of nothing.

Cloud advanced until his feet froze. He glanced down to find them ankle-deep in gluey, transluscent muck.

Aerith's icy glare cut deeper than any sword Cloud had ever faced. "You have no power over me here."

"You were supposed to be dead."

"I've been hearing that a lot lately."

Cloud eyed Tifa, her eyes downcast and her head bowed. "It is her choice. You cannot make her leave."

"Tifa. You have to come with me."

Tifa's head tilted.

"Tifa. Please. You have to. There's no other choice. You don't belong here. You belong out there."

Tifa looked up. Her eyes met Aerith's and they startled her. "What's up there for me? What is there for me anywhere?"

Aerith shook her head and stifled a sob. "Me?"

"Is that the best you can do?"

Aerith's lower lip quivered.

Tifa's gaze softened. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything… But I couldn't. I…"

Aerith grabed her by the wrist and ran as Cloud wretched free from his binding.

They ran. Maybe it was feet or maybe it was kilometers. Cloud reached out to grasp them. That was when the cold sting of being prickled Tifa's face. She heard the voices of two men calling to her as she lay prone against Aerith's naked form.

"You're safe, Tifa… you're safe," Aerith whispered, combing fingers through her damp hair.

But she was not safe. Maybe she never would be again.


	23. Chapter 23: Redemption

**23**

**Redemption**

It was the same ceiling; different occupant. Tifa laid borderline catatonic for the better part of three days in the same room Aerith occupied since her return. It had changed little during that time.

Every night, Aerith slept by her bedside. Tifa writhed and twisted throughout the night. Aerith doubted she dreamt pleasant dreams.

"She's been submerged in the Lifestream for almost two weeks," Angeal told her. "Even SOLDIERs don't have that much direct exposure to mako so fast."

"Is she going to be alright?"

Angeal grimaced. "She probably told you. We met once before. She survived a cut from that." He nodded to the Masamune, still propped against the wall. "I can't think of a lot of people I can say that about. She's made of stern stuff. But the question is, how stern?"

Aerith quirked an eyebrow.

"What Hollander told you before was accurate. Mako can mess with your mind. After my first couple of exposures, I went through a period of having some strange thoughts."

"Strange thoughts?"

"Like people were out to get me. Like I could hear whispering voices around me. Even when I was all alone. Everyone gets them to a point. Most candidates don't meet psychological criteria for SOLDIER. Zack had to have told you about that."

Aerith shook her head in a sad sort of way. "He probably didn't think I'd ever need to know." She certainly would not have seen any of this coming three years ago.

"I'm sure she'll live. The question is…" Angeal stopped and turned back to the door. "When she'll be ready for the real recovery. I'll get the soup on."

Aerith nodded with a half-hearted smile. Angeal deftly changed the question. _The question is, when she wakes up, how sane will she be?_ It was not a nice thought to think about.

Aerith brushed a lock of Tifa's hair away from her face. "Maybe a piece of Zack is still inside of me. You were completely his type."

Tifa's eyes opened groggily. They flashed open the last millimeters. She scanned the room, finally locking onto Aerith. "Aerith…" she whimpered.

Aerith remembered Tifa's gaze when she looked at her in the Lifestream. She was the same now. "Tifa… your eyes…"

Tifa gave her a vacant stare, not seeming to have heard or understood the comment.

Aerith walked to the corner of the room where she had converted an old lab table into a makeshift dresser. She fetched a small mirror and brought it to the bedside.

Tifa squinted at her reflection. She saw a face tired and unkempt. The eyes of iridescent red-brown seemed to hardly startle her at all. She just squinted and stared.

"I thought I'd lost you, Tifa," Aerith whispered.

"Is it true?"

Aerith shook her head. "Is it true? Is what true?"

Tifa's pale blue eyes flashed at her. Aerith had loved Zack's blue eyes, but this would disquiet her for some time yet. "What Cloud said. Is it true?"

Aerith's mouth opened, then closed. "You mean…?"

"Am I pregnant. Aerith."

While they left the Forgotten Capital, Aerith had joined their consciences again. It was to heal Tifa. And she too needed to know.

The proto-matrix of a second consciousness swelled in Tifa's womb.

Aerith nodded.

Tifa looked down. "When… how?"

"Probably that night in Costa Del Sol," Aerith said.

Tifa looked up, half-startled.

Aerith held a steady gave. It came across as more barbed than Aerith intended. _Yes. I know all about that._

Tifa lowered her head.

Aerith placed a tentative hand over Tifa's own. "Don't think about it now. Rest."

Tifa sank back onto the bed and stared at the ceiling.

She did not talk anymore that day.

* * *

Aerith gazed into the evening sky from the porch. Ripples of color glimmered across the Northern sky.

She heard Angeal's voice behind her. "There's a legend."

Aerith turned to see him.

"The Northern Crater was the origin of human life. Those colored lights mark our arrival long, long ago. Have you ever heard that?"

"My mother—Elmyra I mean—didn't really know a lot of stories. She had resigned herself to never having children when she visited the orphanage out of the blue one day. Her husband served in Public Safety and she didn't see a lot of him. I think she was lonely."

"She meant a lot to you, didn't she?"

"She _does_," Aerith corrected him. "She's still alive. I know it. I have to believe it. The Turks held her hostage in Midgar. They told me they would release her after I told Rufus Shinra everything I knew about the Lifesteam and the White Materia. Which I did."

Angeal seemed bemused. "You believed them?"

Aerith allowed herself to smile. "Are you going to call me naïve?"

He leaned against the door frame. "They're about as ruthless as they come."

"Call me crazy if you like, but I met Tseng. Somehow I know… I just know… Again, I know this is crazy… he would never do anything to hurt me."

"You're giving a stranger a lot of credit."

"Maybe," Aerith said.

"Tseng is an honorable man, as far as Shinra employees go. You're right. Zack never liked bureaucratic Public Safety types, but he and Tseng struck up a strange friendship. But even before Rufus Shinra became president, the Turks have always been his lapdogs. I take back what I said before. Forget about the Turks. Rufus Shinra is about as ruthless as they come. You have no reason to trust any of them."

"Well… sometimes maybe trust is a leap of faith you have to take."

"How is Tifa?"

"Asleep."

Angeal stared at her. "Something's different since you went into the Lifestream. You seem… lighter somehow."

"Do I?"

"You do. Don't lose that."

"Weren't you the one ready to call me naïve?"

"I was. And you are. But you are who you are and that's important."

Aerith smiled. Then she heard the whispers—felt the rumbles. Her smile vanished. "He's here."

Angeal jumped upright and ran inside.

Cacophonous clangs and rattles rung through the warehouse. Then there was a horrible sound that was something between a gurgle and a yelp. It was all the more horrible because it was human.

Hollander lay on the ground by Tifa's mattress—his torso pinned through the chest to the floor by Cloud's Buster Sword. His arms and legs were spread wide and flat across the ground. It gave the odd impression of a butterfly on display.

Cloud's feathery raven-black wing fluttered. Blue slit eyes turned to Aerith. He pulled the sword clean away and Hollander's blood flowed undeterred. "You, Aerith Gainsborough, have an unpleasant habit of taking that which is rightfully mine."

Tifa stirred. Her eyes struggled to crack open.

Aerith stood upright, making herself unafraid. "You're not Jenova. You're Cloud. Cloud would never hurt his comrades."

He pointed to her abdomen with the tip of his sword, as though he could see the scar. "Naïve to the end."

Angeal entered behind Aerith with his own sword in-hand. "Stop this, Cloud."

"Or else what, Old Man?"

Angeal broadened his stance and angled his sword towards Cloud.

Cloud half-way smiled, but the smile died. "You would wish for death so readily?"

Angeal stood in cold silence.

"A wise man," Cloud mumbled.

Aerith lept away. Both men flung themselves at each other with a speed and ferocity she had never before seen, collided and deflected away to re-engage less than a second later. Cloud cut high and then low. Angeal parried handily and slashed at Cloud's neck. Cloud dodged away in a flash and again they clashed.

It became obvious to Aerith right away: Angeal was faster and stronger than Cloud. She had seen very few swordsmen at work. She had never seen Zack fight—only Cloud and Sephiroth before. It was clear even to her untrained eyes Angeal was a master. He could do anything Cloud could do while exerting half the effort. But then, that was the Cloud she knew. This Cloud was different. The boost of mako infusion now coupled with a frenzied inhuman power with preternatural insight.

Angeal had no chance. Not really.

Cloud's sword pierced him obliquely through the left shoulder. Angeal stiffled a scream. He brought his sword about again, but he held it only in his right arm. His left, he would never use again, even if he lived decades longer. But he would not.

Cloud approached slowly: his Buster Sword at his flank. One-handed, Angeal slashed. One-handed, Cloud raised his sword and smacked away the blade. He brought the blade down across Angeal's torso.

Fresh blood spilled across the floor. Angeal looked up to Aerith with eyes so much like Zack's. She crept away step by step. Angeal murmered to her. She could not hear his last words. The Buster sword plunged into his back and silenced him forever.

Cloud dislodged the blade and advanced on her.

Aerith tried to steady her thumping heart. "This isn't you. The Cloud I know would never do this."

He smirked. "That would make me the Cloud you _don't_ know." He stepped. And stepped. And stepped. Closer and closer. "Killing you would serve no purpose really. It's rather sad that you shoud die now. Your White Materia is gone. You're just a girl. Powerless. And yet… I will relish this."

He stalled. He heard the footsteps but did not turn in turn in time. The longest, sharpest blade in the world poked through the front of his abdomen. He looked down—studied it with surreal surprise. The blood gushed. He tried to wretch free and the blade's single edge twisted; sawed his insides. He jerked to the floor.

Tifa pulled the Masamune free. Her blue eyes glimmered of steel. "Don't you dare touch her."

Cloud coughed blood. "I could have given you anything you wanted. Anything."

Tifa poised to strike again. "None of it was real."

"You had the chance to have what was real long ago. We both did. After a lifetime of chasing dreams and fantasies, why would you start caring now?"

Tifa held her ground, but choked back a sob. "Stop pretending you're Cloud."

He rose to his feet. He should not have: not with those injuries, but then he was hardly human anymore.

Tifa prepared another blow, but Cloud did not even defend himself. He saw her wavering resolve as surely as Aerith felt it.

Cloud turned away from her and faced Aerith. He raised his sword, but then stalled. Tifa gasped and nearly dropped her sword.

A low, rumbling growl reverberated through the building.

Aerith glanced over her shoulder, past the door. She had seen the hulking, monstrous visage only once before in her life and she would never forget it. Blood red and purple fur glistened off pale fluorescent light.

The Jenova part of Cloud huffed with real exasperation. "You again."

Vincent Valentine roared a bloodcurdling roar.

Cloud feigned resignation. A moment later, he listed his sword and swished it through the air.

Aerith felt the ripple of energy a moment before it materialized. "Down," she cried. Tifa dropped and so did the Galleon Beast.

The air crackled with power and exploded in a deafening boom. The old Shinra facility split in half along the horizontal plane of Cloud's swing. A hairline fracture traced every wall, nearly invisible. The electricity died. The building wobbled.

It would fall any second.

The Galleon Beast rushed Cloud, it's sharp horns bearing towards him, its feet clomping across the ground, causing the foundation of the building to shudder and shimmy. Cloud's sword glowed an iridescent blue and it swept in a broad arc, intercepting its body.

Aerith cried out his name, but it was too late. Vincent shifted back into human form. He had not expected Cloud's fingers to clasp his materializing face and toss him to the ground.

Cloud slammed his head against the floor twice; three times. Hard enamel dented. Powder-fine debris rained from the ceiling. "Not this time, Vincent."

Cloud's fist gleamed with green fire. Vincent screamed.

It happened in a flurry of sounds that bled together: Vincent's scream, Aerith's cry, and Cerebus' mechanical click.

Gunshots rang out. Cloud tumbled back and and away with three rounds to the chest. Aerith saw Vincent vanish in a puddle of black that whirled through the air, capturing her and Tifa.

The world spun end-on-end. Aerith could see nothing, but was vaguely aware of Tifa's presence nearby. It was as she remembered of her trip to Nibelheim. She was unaware of the passage of time: only the empty space surrounded by Vincent's crackling, chaotic soul. Only something was different this time. The strange "noise" of Vincent's presence did not register as the same as it had before. It no longer pulsed to a steady rhythm, like the beating of a heart. It was syncopated and halting, like a broken coffee pot—irregular and punctuated by moments of full stop.

They materialized inside an ancient building the white of bleached bone. She was back in the Forgotten Capital. Tifa landed next to her, the Masamune still in-hand. She gasped at Vincent's crumpled form.

Aerith did not need to see his face to know he was dying.

"He saved us," Tifa whispered. "How did he know…?"

Aerith had never sensed him, but then, Vincent had always done his best to remain alien to her. She touched his shoulder.

His voice rasped. "No. Don't."

Aerith persisted. "You'll die."

Vincent shook his head. His face bled and smoldered.

Aerith pressed her bare skin to his and then flinched back. His soul screamed at the connection. It physically hurt her.

Aerith glowered. The Cetra were innately telepathic. It finally occurred to her. Vincent had somehow inverted that power. "You think you can keep me out? Well, tough."

Aerith forced her way past his shell and once past, found herself sucked in.

The world went black.

* * *

She was in a dark place. The voices of the Lifestream were gone. They could never reach this place with all of its energy focused inward.

The first light came from a little hut, not unlike the ones scattered throughout the Forgotten Capital. A small boy with short black hair and sanguine eyes wore a tattered tunic, racing along the banks of the lakes of mako.

Aerith followed him, unseen: a ghost among ghosts. He ran for a quarter mile and Aerith followed behind. He approached another hut not unlike his: the windows of this one lined with bright red and green curtains. A small girl exited the hut.

Aerith gasped. It was her. As a young girl, she had looked identical.

No. Not quite identical. This girl was different. Her eyes were the same, but the hair was off, and so was the shape of her face, if only a little.

The little girl wore a bow and arched her back to smile at the boy from below. They spoke, but in a language Aerith could not comprehend. She did not need to understand the words, however. Every bend of his knee; every doodle in the sand with his toes; every downcast gaze from the boy said "love."

Aerith spoke and her voice echoed across the deep ponds of mako, as still and unmoving as glass. "Vincent. We need to talk."

Neither the boy, nor the girl, nor the other Cetra emerging and vanishing into homes heard.

Aerith closed her eyes, wishing she could feel some semblance of his feelings, but there was nothing. "Vincent… I need to be able to touch you to heal you. If I can't do that, you'll die."

Eerie silence was his only response.

"Vincent… if you die now, I'm afraid you'll stay here in this illusion. If that happens, you won't re-enter the Lifestream. And then you'll never see my mother again."

The players froze and then the scene vanished to black.

She stood in a bar not unlike Seventh Heaven: where in the world, Aerith could not say. The walls were all wood paneling. She felt the air—Vincent's memory was that vivid—and it was cold. An upright piano chimed from the corner—a young man with long, blond hair played an upbeat, if not wistful, melody. A few women peppered the room. They reminded Aerith of the girls of the Honeybee Inn: flirty and sultry. The rest were appreciative men here. Except for one, who did not seem appreciative at all. With long black hair and a red coat, he just sat and sulked.

That was him all right.

A woman entered through the door and approached. She was not like the others. She was dressed conservatively. Dark brown eyes hid behind glasses and she wore her matching hair in a long braid. She had on a long, white coat. She stood out in this place and men turned to stare at her approach. Regardless, she had the look of a woman who knew exactly where she was and what she was doing when she slinked into the bar stool next to Vincent. All of that even though she was the only non-working woman here.

He did not even turn to confirm her identifty. "What will this do to your reputation, Dr. Crescent?"

She gave him a long, thin-lipped smile. "You don't want to talk to me in the Old Tongue?"

"And out you here of all places? What do you take me for?"

"So aren't you going to ask me if I'd like a drink?"

Vincent glared. "You can order your own damn beer, Lucrecia. Or Cosmopolitan. Or Red Mage,* or whatever you damn well want to drink."

Her smile faded. "What's the matter? I thought you'd want to talk. We haven't in so long."

"Yeah?" He sipped. How's jackass?"

"He's fine." She did not even bat an eyelash. "We're staying busy."

Vincent's jaw clenched. "You heard, didn't you?"

She did not deny it. "I wanted to see how you were. I know we haven't heard from Famis for over a month. No one in Shinra has."

"And that's the irony of it all, isn't it? We fought. For centuries we hid. We roughed it out and lost most of our numbers to the Doom. All along we should have just asked to become research subjects."

"You make it sound so wrong."

"We're so old and proud. The years everyone in this room have been alive would hardly add up to our lifespans so far."

She shrugged.

"Remember when the Nibel Wolves almost died off a couple of years ago?" Vincent asked. "Captivity and selective breeding. That was all it took."

She gave him a glib shrug. "Or else, if you can't beat them, join them." She lowered her voice. "We are superior in nearly every way. Why should we pretend it isn't so? That's something you should consider. You've got a lot of…" she glanced him up and down in a way Aerith could not help but perceive as a bit creepy. "Talents."

"We've watched our race die," Vincent whispered. "Have you ever wondered… What if this is it? What if there's no meaning to any of it?"

She nudged him. "You're drunk. Only drunks talk like that."

Vincent lowered his head and took another sip.

"Gast will protect her," she said. "He'll take good care of her. The same for the child…"

"Yeah? I wonder."

"Would you at least like to know how she's doing?"

Vincent cast her a measured look—dark and thoughtful. "If you want to go knocking, they're in Icycle Inn."

Lucrecia stared.

"She made me promise not to tell. Like I care anymore." He took a drink and then washed away to nothing.

Darkness embraced Aerith again.

"That wasn't when I lost my soul," Vincent said. "It was when I found out what happened later that I did."

He emerged from shadow. Aerith watched him with a wide-eyed stare as he approached.

"That's the punchline. Is it funny, Aerith? Is it ironic? This whole time I made a show of helping you and friends in your quest to stop Jenova. It was all my fault. Everything. It's because of me Jenova has the key to Gaia's destruction. It's because of me Lucrecia killed your mother and father."

Aerith closed her eyes.

"The Cetra created Jenova and it was their greatest mistake. They never really and truly intended to use it. Level heads always prevailed. It was my pride and stupidity that betrayed the planet. Betrayed my friends. Betrayed you." He looked up to an imaginary sky. Even in his dream, he cried.

"Stop it."

"Before I ever met you I caused you more pain than…"

"Stop it, I said!"

Vincent looked at her with wide eyes.

"I told you once and I'll tell you again. Get over yourself."

Vincent's jaw dropped.

"I'm glad that you feel so responsible for my pain." Her words bit. "I'll have you know the only life I've really known was in Midgar with people I've loved and who loved me. I've had a lot of hurt in my life. Bad things have happened to me. I've lost a lot of people I've loved. But who hasn't?

"But…"

"You screwed up, all right? So what do you do now? You can heal or you can shut yourself out."

He stammered. "Everything I did…"

Her cheeks flushed. She was genuinely mad. "Look, getting inside your head hurt. I'm not going to put up with any more self-pity. If you're going to go on and on about all the terrible things you've done and then cry crocodile tears, just say so and I'll let you wallowand die in this void. If you want to actually fix what you've done and find some kind of redemption, then say the word and I'll help you."

He still watched her with wide eyes. "I'll think about it?"

She crossed her arms. "Well, you'd better think fast. You're going into shock pretty bad and I'm not letting you take me with you. If you don't want to die, you have to let me open a connection between us so I can heal you."

"I can't sense the Lifestream. I don't think it will help me."

Aerith relaxed. "I don't know if it has to. I will. You just have to trust me. And that was always your problem, wasn' it?"

His eyes softened and for the first time since she had known him, looked vulnerable.

Aerith reached out her hand.

Vincent decided not to die and took it.

* * *

It was the next morning before Vincent's strength returned. Aerith too felt more drained than usual. Vincent's conscience still resisted the Lifestream. Healing him had been like pulling the infected tooth of a squirming, unanesthetized child. It probably hurt her more than it hurt him.

He caught her stare and looked away. She looked so much like her mother at the bloom of her womanhood…

In some ways, Aerith felt more comfortable when she was unable to read his mind.

Tifa entered the hut with a makeshift spear—a thin tree limb carved to a point. She carried skewered fish all along its length.

"That was fast," Aerith said.

"Yeah," Tifa said. "I figured it out—the faster these fish move, the better they are." Her eyes twinkled. The brightness of their blue faded, but there remained a cool blue halo around her red-brown irises. The day before, Aerith would never have imagined Tifa would be the strongest, healthiest member of their ad hoc party. And yet, there was a liveliness and virility to her unlike anything Aerith had seen in her before. Maybe it had something to do with returning to the wild. In spite of that, a darkness lingered in her heart.

Aerith gave her a look that she wanted to say, "We should talk." Their psychic link diminished since that initial connection, but since rescuing her from the Lifestream, had intensified, if a little. Like Cloud and Zack before him, Aerith had an unwavering window into her feelings. It was the mako.

That was why without even having to say a word, Aerith knew Tifa was not ready to talk yet.

"How did you know where we were?" Aerith asked Vincent.

"I was never far," he said. "I knew from the time I left you might be in danger, so I sought you out. Besides. I wanted to see it for myself. Icycle Inn."

Aerith did not need to ask. "But from there?"

"I could not find you or Tifa so I imagined you both lived. It was easy enough for me to find you afterwards. It took a few days, but there are not many safe hiding places on this Goddess-foresaken continent. I kept watch a safe distance from the old Modeoheim facility. When Cloud attacked…"

Cloud. Not Sephiroth. Cloud. That would take getting used to.

Aerith heard a clinking of wood. She turned and Tifa pretended she had not heard, busying herself by the fire. She had split it herself. It was clear now more than ever: Tifa would never have that cabin in the woods of Mt. Nibel.

Cloud.

Aerith saw him. Really saw him. Suddenly, she could not smell the beginnings of burning embers in the fireplace. She could not hear Vincent or Tifa's calls of concern. All she could feel were the Lifestream's choppy currents as countless souls plunged in. All she could smell was the burning of a far greater, preternatural mako-fueled fire. All she could hear were desperate death-cries. All she could see was a sight Jenova herself forced into her mind's eye.

Midgar crumbled and burned.

* * *

_A/N: I'm hoping to amp up writing and try to finish off the story within the next couple of months. Thanks for reading and thanks for the continued reviews!_

_Footnote:_

_*The Red Mage: so named because it's got a little bit of just about everything in it. And it's red. Here's the basic recipe:_

_1 part vodka_

_1 part triple sec_

_1/2 part rum_

_1/4 part gin_

_1 spash grenadine_

_Cranberry juice to taste._

_Best served on the rocks. For a Level 99 Red Mage, decrease the cranberry juice proportional to other things. if you're not careful, this can be a total stealth drink._

_That's all for now!_


	24. Chapter 24: Burning Midgar

**24**

**Burning Midgar**

"Oh, hell no. No, no, no."

"_What? _ _What is it Reno?_"

Reno squinted through his binoculars. "The mark is going into the group room."

Tseng's sigh came through loud and clear over the PHS. "_I doubt it's anything you haven't seen before._"

Reno watched from a rooftop, unseen by the Honeybee Inn's bouncers. "Yeah, but it's Thursday night and I haven't had eight beers and a favor-tini."

"_Reno… Did you just say, 'flavortini?'_"

"Look boss, I'm not proud of the flavor-tini. I would've never had it if I hadn't had beer number seven."

"_Just keep your eye on him and don't let the details distract you._"

"You ain't kidding. Those are some details. How much longer are we going to have to do this bullshit?"

"_As long as Rufus Shinra wants us to._"

"Yeah? Since when does Administrative Research involve snooping around a whorehouse?"

"_Do I really need to tell you?_"

"It keeps my mind off of what I'm looking at."

"_Because we're untouchable, Reno. Since those Public Safety grunts sold out to Corneo, President Shinra figures we're the only ones he knows for sure he can trust._"

"Why don't we just move on them?"

"_Because Corneo may yet be useful. The President doesn't want to burn that bridge. Not yet anyway._"

"Why fear a glorified pimp?"

"_Watch it, Reno. It's not fear. The fact of the matter is, Corneo's more than willing to wade into shit we won't._"

"Right. And kidnap our rightfully-kidnapped hostages. Here's the punchline. It's not even like we need those hostages anymore. Barret Wallace is in custody in the Sector Four Detention Center and we don't even know for sure Aerith Gainsborough survived Cosmo Canyon."

"_Well, you know what? With General Sephiroth dead, it's business as usual._"

Reno dropped the binoculars. General Sephiroth _was_ dead. While investigating a geological disturbance at the Icycle Inn ruins, they found the body. Rude himself confirmed it. After half a week, he still lay perfectly preserved in the ice. No wild animals dared touch the cadaver.

That was good, right?

None of the Turks liked it. None of them. Tseng said it best himself: "I don't like anything that just doesn't make any damn sense."

"But Tseng… Don't you think we'd be put to better use elsewhere just the same?"

"_Reno… whether or not Aerith's still alive, we gave our word Elmyra and the little girl would be safe. That's nothing to take lightly. I don't know what that sick bastard Corneo intends to do with them, but we have to make sure they're safe._"

For once in his life, Reno held his tongue. Tseng let his personal feelings bleed into his work so seldom it was obvious every time he did. "Yeah. I hear you." He lifted the binoculars again and continued to watch the defected guard through the wall. He wished Shinra technology were not as advanced as it was. Maybe in another alcohol and drug-infused life, this place would have tempted him into AWOL. He felt sorry for the couple of Public Safety men who had failed to return the AVALANCHE hostages and stayed on with Corneo. If Corneo wormed his way out of this situation, it would be at their scapegoated expense.

Reno watched for a few more minute before averting his eyes. They were near the squishy part.

The lights outside the Honeybee Inn flared and then exploded. So did every other light in the Wall Market. No sunlight penetrated the concrete and metal plates, so blackness enveloped him.

A deafening bang rang his eardrums. Gaia quivered. Debris rained form the plate above.

Shit.

When the ringing in his ears finally subsided, Reno heard Tseng. His frantic voice frightened him. Tseng was never frantic.

"_Reno, Reno can you hear me?_"

Dust misted his eyes and he tried to brush it away. "Tseng, what the fuck was that?"

"_I said, abort the mission and get to a shelter. Now!_"

"What's going on?"

"Something just blew Reactor One to hell."

Reno let the words sink in. Tseng was still talking, but he stopped listening. It was still pitch black. Where was his flashlight? The same out-of-reach place as all the rest of his equipment. Muffled, startled cries filled the gritty air. He trembled all over and fumbled at stuffing his surveillance equipment back into the briefcase.

Then the second explosion hit.

* * *

"Are you watching this, Jecht? You're a witness to history."

Jecht watched out the window of Rufus Shinra's office. For the fire and explosions, Midgar shone as bright as day. His PHS vibrated for he fourth time in as many minutes. He still ignored it. All he really wanted, now more than ever, was a drink.

Reactor Eight blew—the second-to-last functional mako reactor on the planet. The flames burned in a concentric circle around the tower. Now, only Junon remained.

Rufus Shinra paled. To the last, he would not be surprised by fate: no matter how cruel. He sat at his desk and poured amber fluid into a snifter. "Would you care for a drink, Jecht? The grapes were harvested in Nibelheim. Before the incident, of course. It's an inhospitable climate, but grapes make the best brandy when they have to struggle to survive. Have you ever been?"

Jecht measured his words. "Never. And I never wanted to."

"I went once," Rufus said. "I found nothing worthwhile there. Not the art. Not the architecture. Not the hicks who called it home. Mount Nibel is like any other untamable wilderness I've ever seen. Even this brandy is pleasant, but would be unremarkable if it weren't so rare. Nothing gives a thing value more than endangerment and death."

A jolt rocked the tower. Jecht watched Rufus Shinra lean back against his chair. He remained unmoving. "We need to get to safety, sir."

"And not bear witness?"

"To…?"

"This is the day Shinra lost to Gaia." Rufus Shinra's gaze remained transfixed—hypnotized.

"Sir?"

"For twenty-four generations, the Shinra family has done it's best to rape the bitch into submission. She finally fought back and bit off our jewels."

Jecht remained still and unmoving: even as his PHS vibrated for the fifth time. He had never seen the President more lucid. Whether he was resigned, drunk, or mad, he would never know.

"Sir, it has to be Wutainese separatists. General Sephiroth's dead."

The intercom clicked on. A solitary voice rose above dozens of panicked murmers. "_Sir, someone just broke the lobby wall down. As in… he just made the wall collapse. He's coming in. It's… It's…_" The voice faded. A new voice added, "_Sir, I think it's the terrorist, Cloud Strife. Only… No!_" The intercom clicked off.

Rufus tilted his head back. "But Jenova is not."

The PHS still vibrated. "Sir, an order?"

Rufus waived his hand. "You don't need an order. You just need to decide. Whose are you?" His blue eyes gleamed brighter for the flicker of mako spilling forth from the reactors' exposed cavities.

Jecht turned and left the office. Rufus' pretty secretary was already gone. He called the elevator and when it closed behind him, he finally answered the damn PHS. "Scarlet?"

"_Get out of there, Jecht,_" she said.

Jecht's nostrils flared. "What?"

"_We saw him on surveillance. It's Jenova for sure. Get as many SOLDIERs as you can out of the tower. He'll kill them all._"

Jecht watched the floors descend. The tower's emergency backup power flickered.

"_Jecht? Can you hear me?_"

"What about the President?"

She answered after two or three beats. "_What about him?_"

Something in her tone echoed his tone from a conversation a time long ago. He imagined her whisper, "_Are you going to cry?_" He hung up.

He drew his sword. It was not as long as Sephiroth's or Angeal's. They had been obsessed with long swords. Just the same, it would get the job done. He thought. He hoped.

The elevator ticked down floors. There was a stairwell outside. He still had an opportunity to leave. Then the elevator stopped at the lobby and the opportunity passed.

The elevator door opened. The sight before him made Jecht wish he had taken the President up on the brandy.

Blue slit eyes regarded Jecht. The rest was blood and fire. He had never met Cloud Strife as a SOLDIER. As a monster, he was terrifying.

The promenade collapsed. Cloud lifted his sword. It was almost as large as Angeal's.

"What happened to Sephiroth?" Jecht said, when he was finally able to speak.

"I killed him."

"You killed him and then decided to finish his work?"

"I'm finishing my own work."

A loud ping reverabed from across the floor. The freight elevator at the end of the corridor opened. A dozen SOLDIERs rushed out, clad in burnished armor, bearing narrow broadswords.

Jecht barely got the words out. "Hold. He's more powerful than you know."

Cloud swung his sword and a flash of green traversed the hall. Kunsel took the lead. He lifted the sword and narrowed his eyes. His hair splayed, coursing with power and the sword flared with light. Cloud's flash of energy dissipated at impact with Kunsel's blade.

Kunsel widened his eyes just in time to see Cloud Strife lop his head off.

The second SOLDIER hesitated. Cloud split him in half on the downswing.

The third SOLDIER charged with abandon. Cloud stabbed him and his Buster Sword pierced him into his chest and out his spine.

The fourth SOLDIER tried to attack Cloud's blind spot. Cloud did not have a blind spot. Cloud dislodged his sword from the fresh corpse and backfisted the SOLDIER with such force his jaw broke. His neck followed a second later.

The fifth SOLDIER swung down mightily and almost made contact. Then Cloud ducked out and away. His sword sliced off the SOLDIER's arms above the elbow. Cloud caught the lesser sword in his left hand and launched forward, piercing his attacker through the ribs. The sixth SOLDIER behind them had no way of seeing the sword coming until it lodged into him.

The seventh and eighth SOLDERs fell, stopped by a mighty swish of Cloud's Buster Sword that sent a ripple of power through the air. It sliced them cleanly in half.

Cloud leapt into the air, a blade in each hand. SOLDIER number nine fell on the upswing and ten, on the downswing.

SOLDIER number eleven tried to run but did not see the falling pylon.

SOLDIER number twelve stumbled to the ground and wet himself. Cloud used both swords as though they were a pair of scissors and removed his head.

Cloud turned to Jecht. "Are you next, Old Man?"

"There are a lot more SOLDIERs where they came from."

Now two dozen flooded past the broken promenade and poised to attack.

Cloud saw them surrounding him, bemused. "I was hoping they would show up sooner or later."

Jecht watched them pounce. He knew they would die. All of them. Every last one.

It was not the most selfless or courageous thing to do, but it was what had to be done nonetheless. "Stop them," he cried. "Buy some time."

Jecht turned towards the elevator.

* * *

Rufus drank too much, too fast. When Jecht burst through the office doors, he could scarcely tell the shudders and sways of Shinra Tower's foundation from those of his unfocused brain.

"Is this how the fucking Cetra felt when my great-grandfathers wiped them out at Condor Mountain?"

Jecht grasped at Rufus' hands. "We need to get out of here, Mr. President."

Rufus pulled them free. "I already told you I plan to stay through this to the end."

Jecht restrained a torrent of anger. It was obvious just from looking at him. "Jenova's inside. Your goddamn SOLDIERs are dying so I can buy enough time to get you out of here."

Rufus' hazy eyes focused on Jecht. His eyes were wide and scared. "And why do you care what happens to me?" Not even his own father did _that_.

"Because it's my job and because it's the fuckin' right thing to do."

As Shinra Tower swayed, Rufus realized through a mist of brandy no one had ever run into a burning building to save him before. Even the ones that he paid. He wiped his eyes and stood. It took a second or more to compose himself. This was the desk where his father died and he had resolved to die here too. Not because it was what he wanted. It was what he deserved. His father was a heartless bastard and so was _he_. Even the planet agreed. In Jecht's blurry eyes, he saw another way. He saw hope for redemption. If just one man could…

An explosion to Rufus' left knocked him backwards. A smoky, shadowy form crawled slinking up from below. Irridescent eyes emerged from the abyss.

Sometimes redemption was just not in the cards.

Cloud Strife stepped out of the black plume from below. His eyes remained locked on Rufus Shinra. His eyes never left. When Jecht slashed him from behind, he unlatched his Buster Sword and parried without a glance. Cloud spun and slashed. The force of his sword propelled Jecht back several steps.

Cloud approached Jecht. His single black-feathered wing fluttered. "I could feel the mako flow through your body. All of their bodies. It connected all of us. How does it feel being the last living SOLDIER, Jecht?"

Jecht bristled. He had never given his name. He screamed and rushed again. His speed startled Cloud, or Jenova, or whatever he was in that moment, but not enough for his attack to connect.

Their swords locked at the hilt. Cloud glanced over his shoulder at Rufus Shinra, watching pale-faced in front of his desk.

"You want to kill him? You have to kill me first."

Cloud's cat-slit eyes flared. With a push, Jecht slammed hard into the far wall. "You don't get it, do you? I want to kill both of you. Don't you understand?"

Jecht stood, stunned. Then he rushed again—fruitlessly—blindly.

Cloud readied his sword. "Too bad you won't be able to thank me later."

He readied a killing blow, but hesitated, his eyes darting to a window. Jecht parried and countered with a cut burrowing deep into his side.

Jecht grinned like a fool and withdrew the blade. He raised it high above his head and brought it down in a frenzied slash. Cloud deflected it away and kicked Jecht in the shin. Rufus heard a loud crack. Jecht fell and screamed, his leg splintered.

Jecht's attack had been predictable. Desperate. Even Rufus could see that. Rufus knew more than most what Jenova was capable of doing. How had that strike connected?

Rufus looked where Cloud had looked.

He was being watched. They all were.

* * *

Scarlet's eyes strained from studying the monitor. It was late. The dim Junon control room was lit but barely. The Code Red warning lights flashed. A steady klaxon rang.

"Drone Five can't get visual confirmation of President Shinra, Ma'am," the young, red-haired tech cried.

Her Knight fell. Her champion. Her Percival. Her poor, naïve drunkard. His fuzzy form rolled, sprawling on the ground. Jenova's new host approached and kicked him again. Jecht stumbled away. Now Jenova was only playing with him. Scarlet had little sympathy. His reinstatement to SOLDIER had been her idea. She tried to distance herself from the decision, but no doubt Rufus had known. He played her own game all too willingly without understanding the rules. Still, without Jenova, it may have been her loss yet. She had miscalculated. Her failure had been picking an ally with some semblance of a moral compass.

Poor Jecht. She had almost genuinely enjoyed him. If they could have met again, she would have explained how the sensible Captains never really went down with the ship.

But they never would meet again, would they?

"The President is dead," Scarlet said. "In his absence, I'm assuming emergency powers under Title VII of the Public Safety Charter."

The red-head did not comprehend her words at first. He gave her an incredulous stare. "Dead? But…"

"We have to contain Jenova. Ensign Bidge, aim the Sister Ray. Our target is Shinra Tower."

Confused mumbling erupted through the control room.

"If Jenova isn't stopped right now, he'll come to Junon. Midgar's lost. I'm not letting Shinra disappear from the planet."

The confused mumbling yielded to terrified silence.

"The President…" the bearded reactor tech at the power relay station began.

"…Is dead," Scarlet finished. "I'll ask you one more time, Ensign Bidge. Aim the Sister Ray or be prepared to accept court marshall. You'll find me less forgiving than Rufus Shinra."

Everyone knew exactly how forgiving Rufus Shinra was. Ensign Bidge hesitated no more than a second before beginning to enter the targeting solution at his terminal.

The red-head watched in concerned silence. The cannon powered up with a low, guttural warble. The lights dimmed as enough mako power to charge a city prepared to soar free.

* * *

Cloud raised his Buster Sword and brought it to bear on Jecht. Jecht could barely see; barely think for the pain. It was not just a compound fracture. The force of the kick ripped and tore at muscle. The lower half of his shin and foot dangled by frayed threads of muscle. He would never walk again on that leg if he even survived this encounter, which seemed more unlikely by the second. Still, somehow he parried. Somehow, cut after cut, Cloud could not deliver the finishing blow.

"You could have walked away," Cloud said. "I would have hunted you of course. But you could have had a reprieve. If only for a little while."

Jecht flailed blindly. Cloud deflected easily. Jecht snarled. "Bum-fucking terrorist."

Cloud channeled mako power into the blade. It glowed bright green.

This time, when Jecht attacked, Cloud's parry snapped his blade in half.

Cat-slit eyes flared. "The fates are cruel. There are no dreams. No honor remains." Cloud raised his sword.

Jecht leapt with his good leg. He caught Cloud as he turned, thrusting the hilt end of his broken blade through his rib cage. For only moment, he thought he heard an inhuman squeal. Jecht twisted the blade and cackled with manic glee. _I beat you, fucker. I beat you, asshole._

Then Jecht's glee died. He looked into Cloud's alien cat-slit eyes and saw fear. It was not fear of him.

Rufus Shinra stood and looked south. He first saw a glimmer that became a glow. Then a sun.

Walls and windows flashed out of being. Night became day. There was no sound—only light of the brightest, hottest white bathing over Jecht before he vanished into nothing.


	25. Chapter 25: Maria and Draco

**25**

**Maria and Draco**

While the fallen city sulked in cold darkness, the little girl and the aging woman rested in light. Diesel generators thumped morning, noon, and night outside of the house that never slept. The mako generators were gone. The age of mako was over. None of the bouncers, pimps, and entertainers said as much, but they could tell. No matter when they were ever able to look outside, they saw only a cavernous void. There was power, but their captor controlled it. Elmyra had never been so aware of how without power, they lived in the world's largest network of caves: built by man, for man. Midgar was the center of Shinra. Without Midgar, Shinra meant nothing.

After almost a week, they were still stuck. There was still no power. The Public Safety men who watched over them during the early days of their stay at the Honey Bee Inn paid less and less attention to their duty. Now Elmyra saw them only when they came to receive Don Corneo's gratitude in one of the many entertainment rooms. Their current guardians rotated. Some looked on them with lascivious eyes. This would end someday—how, no one could tell.

There was nothing to do but wait and hope.

* * *

Aerith opened her eyes. She had fallen asleep. It was that dream again. Waves rocked the rusted cabin to and fro. By the fourth day at sea, Tifa was concerningly nauseas. Vincent was nowhere to be found. He spent some of his time on the top deck to glean word of Midgar from other sailors, but fitting in had never been his strong suit. Aerith would have known that even if she had not shared his brain the better part of a week before.

The fishermen here were a private, suspicious lot. Aerith had never known many and could not tell whether this was on account of the nature of fishermen, or more particular to these ones. They were smugglers, though they would never admit it. Vincent payed more than what was fair or even sane to book them passage, but even then, no one trusted them. No one trusted anyone else on this ship.

The captain swept past on his way to the galley. He cast a cursory glance into the cabin as he did every day, as though verifying the mattresses were in place, the fortified wine had not been depleted, and yes, the cabin was still rusted. He was a bearded, patch-eyed man with the disconcerting name of Cid. Aerith had never noticed how common the name was until Vincent drew attention to it. Now the world seemed brim-full of Cids.

Tifa was watching her sleep. "Will we run into any trouble?"

Aerith shrugged. "I hear Public Safety's in shambles. Vincent talked to someone earlier who said no one's seen Rufus Shinra since Shinra Tower exploded. There's even rumor that there's been some kind of power grab within Shinra. No one knows. There's still no electricity. No media. It's as though…" she swore to herself she would not cry. "It's almost as though Migar's a wilderness."

Tifa leaned forward. Aerith caught the faint glow of her eyes. Brash and assertive: sometimes she really did remind her of an introverted, female Zack. "We'll find them, Aerith."

Aerith looked away and nodded.

So they sat in awkward silence for well over an hour. Aerith wondered what could be done once they arrived in Midgar. Tifa retreated again to her private, inner-world.

By the time Vincent arrived, Aerith sat reading in the far corner of the cabin. Whether or not he noticed the awkward energy about the room, he was nice enough not to say as much.

"What did you find out?" Aerith asked.

He unlatched his soggy raincoat. "No one patrols the waters nearest Midgar anymore. Smugglers come and go unchecked. Whoever is in control of Shinra has abandoned it. We should be able to disembark without too much trouble."

"Are there a lot of people there now?" Tifa asked.

"They say there are a lot…" Vincent said with unusual caution. "But the conditions are terrible. Food and water are scarce. They say Don Corneo's stepped up to fill the power vacuum and his reach is everywhere. He controls commodity prices and takes a cut of everything. He controls most of the city's entrances and exits. What's left of Public Safety is too scared to challenge him."

"What does it take to get into the city?" Aerith asked.

Vincent grimaced. "Can I tell you exactly what was told to me? The chief quartermaster said, 'You've got to know someone, pay someone, or fuck someone.' Suffice it to say most smugglers opt for giving Corneo a cut."

"Well…" Aerith said, "That limits our options, doesn't it?"

"Is it possible they've left the city?" Tifa asked. Aerith already knew the answer.

Vincent shook his head. "Don Corneo doesn't want anyone leaving his own private empire. What I said just now applies for leaving Midgar just as well as entering it."

"If we had some idea… some starting point, it would be easier to find Marlene, Barret, and Elmyra," Tifa said.

"We don't have to spend a lot of time finding them," Aerith said. "Elmyra and Marlene are with Corneo in Sector Six.

Tifa narrowed her eyes. "What?"  
"I dreamed of them," Aerith said. "They're at the Honeybee Inn."

"But what about Barret?" Tifa asked.

"I don't know," Aerith said. "I can't seem to find him." When he was wounded and on the cusp of dying, she had not been able to heal him. Now when she tried to find him, she could not. She was worried. Her best guess was she had cut himself off from the Lifestream in the same way Vincent had.

When the ship docked; Vincent, Tifa, and Aerith left with their provisions—clothing and emergency Shinra rations mostly. Tifa brought the Masamune. She draped it in a brocade sack. Just the same, it was obvious to any curious onlookers what the long, curved shape was, but no one was audacious enough to ask.

The trek to Midgar lasted through the afternoon. They rode in a long caravan to the city along with a geshtal greens smuggler. Aerith knew he missed his granddaughter. She plucked it right out of his brain. She also knew she reminded him of her. It was the only free ride they got all trip.

Only when they got there could they comprehend the horror. The stories were true. Damaged infrastructure radiated out from the mako reactors. Shinra tower was a desiccated corpse: part skin, part raw bone, and part nothing where there should have been something. Aerith remembered her stay there and did not miss it. Still, she remembered the night of the attack. The loss of life had been staggering. She glanced at Tifa to clear her thoughts. She did not even have to. Cloud never left her mind.

Tifa stared at the destruction, humbled. She would not say a word. She did not have to.

_Poor girl._

They disembarked from the caravan. The grandfatherly smuggler got a hug for his trouble.

A large band of men and women coalesced near the gate. Some had camped out in tents, big and small. The sound of horns and strings emanated from one of the largest tents. Musicians or actors. A glance inside that particular tent revealed men and women cavorting about in various stages of period press, the likes of which Gaia had not seen worn day-today in centuries. A few bystanders seemed to be attempting to negotiate with Don Corneo's men, but received only irritated head shakes in kind. For the better part of an hour, they surveyed the area, not daring to venture too close to Corneo's men. Neither Tifa nor Aerith could remember much of the Honeybee Inn's staff. They could not say who might recognize them.

"I could teleport us all through," Vincent said. "The range is short enough."

"Maybe," Aerith said, "but what do we do once we're inside?"

Vincent quirked an eyebrow. "Was the purpose of this trip not to infilitrate the Honeybee Inn and then rescue your friends?"

Tifa and Aerith looked at each other. "We didn't leave Corneo on the best terms last time," Aerith said.

Vincent opened his mouth to speak, but did not have the chance.

"Maria, what are you doing over there?"

All three turned to the voice. He wore a tie and vest and was clean-cut—the most clean-cut man they had seen in months—yet his hair was frazzled—his face seemed wrinkled long before its time, perhaps by a perpetual glare of hypomania. He was staring right at them and coming closer. "Maria… we must rehearse. You have to put all of those thoughts aside so we can…" He hesitated. "Oh… you're… not Maria?"

Tifa and Aerith looked at each other and then him; said at the same time, "Me?"

* * *

The Impresario waved his hands. "Don't think about it. Just… stop thinking about it. The more you think about it, the less it makes sense, but suffice it to say, Don Corneo has… peculiar tastes…"

"We know," Tifa and Aerith said in unison. They caught each other's eyes and smiled, if briefly.

They sat in the Impresario's personal tent. Candlelight on red canvas cast eerie shadows across his books, scripts, and treatises. He could not stop staring even as he handed them the letter. They had not yet met Maria, but the resemblance must have been uncanny.

Tifa read the letter.

_ To my dearest Maria, I anxiously await your performance. When it is through, you shall be my caged canary forever._

Vincent sat with his arms folded. "So to summarize… Don Corneo has his sights set on this Maria of yours. And you're afraid he'll have her abducted. And you still intend to perform in Midgar because…?"

The Impresario folded his arms in kind. He seemed ready to eviscerate Vincent, as if that could happen. "Have you ever performed?"

"A long time ago," Vincent said.

The girls stared.

Vincent looked away. "What?"

The Impresario scratched his head. "Well, then you can understand that in these days of film and mass-media, you can take any stage you can get. Furthermore, wth spotty power at best, what better time is there to play in Midgar?"

Aerith suspected the Impresario did not grasp how Vincent probably defined "a long time ago."

The Impresario stood and paced. "It's not that if I can't play this show in downtown I won't be able to pay the cast. I haven't been able to pay them in weeks. Without this show, we're through. We'll never make it to the next venue with a stage of sufficient size. We need this. And yet, Maria is our most seasoned, best performer. I can't lose her."

"How sure are you she'll be kidnapped?" Tifa asked.

He winced. "Not quite a hundred percent, but reasonably close."

"Why so sure?" Tifa asked.

"Because he's done this before. In essentially the same way. An actress from Gongaga some years back. He had a peculiar fancy for her. He adored her work. His lackies kidnapped her and took him back to the Honeybee Inn. In the middle of the fourth act."

Aerith leaned forward in her chair. "What happened?"

"No one knows," he said. "They say he enjoyed her company for some time in whatever way he does. Then she ended up in his brothel."

Aerith stifled a grimace and wondered if this performer was one of the girls she encountered in her brief stay there. Disturbingly enough, that was a best-case scenario.

"All that to say," The Impresario said, "If I'm lucky, he won't kidnap her until late in the performance. Not that it matters. With her gone, we're doomed. Slain. KO'd. Nothing will be able to revive us."

Tifa glanced at Aerith with a questioning look—one that seemed to ask permission to take a chance. Aerith hoped the look she offered in return conveyed she had no clue what Tifa had in mind. Apparently it did not do so well enough.

"Would bodyguards help?" Tifa asked.

Vincent let his impenetrable social face crack for long enough to reveal he was impressed with the idea.

The Impresario appraised the three. Skeptical did not say the half of it. "Are you offering yourselves?"

Tifa sat upright, emboldened. "I'm a martial artist trained under the legendary warrior monk Zangan."

"I'm an ex-Turk," Vincent said.

The Impresario turned to Aerith.

"I'm a flower girl from the slums."

The Impresario did not speak for a long moment. "I have this strange feeling like I'm about to be hustled."

"Nothing of the sort," Tifa said. "We're not asking for much. We'll do it for free even."

"That makes me even more suspicious. What do you get out of it?"

"All we want is a cover to get into Midgar."

"You're not afraid of Don Corneo? You should be."

"We're not afraid of him. You could even say he's the reason we want to get into Midgar."

The Impresario leaned forward, suddenly riveted. "Oh? Do tell."

"There's something he has that we want back at the Honeybee Inn," Tifa said. "And that's all we need to say."

"So…" The Impresario's thoughts formed visibly. "Not only do you want to get into Midgar. You want a way into Corneo' stronghold. Is that right? And I take it you plan to give him his just-desserts."

Tifa smiled at Aerith. Piece by piece, the plan formed.

Vincent did not like it.

* * *

By the following night, they sat together in the stage's right wing. Of all the strange places their journey had taken them, the last place they expected may well have been the Midgar Grand Plate Theater. An opera house of all places. Tifa and Aerith passed nearby on their first evening out together. In hindsight, Aerith was glad they had not seen Loveless. They had had enough of that play. How different the sight had been that night. As they approached the theater that evening, the streets were lit, but without consistency. It was clear rolling blackouts were the norm. The saddest thing Aerith saw: the people. They seemed disheveled; traumatized. They watched the troup of outsiders with eyes that cried, "Save us."

What did they expect from actors and actresses?

Act One was over. Aerith paid little attention to the long soliloquy about the fall of the West. The script called for a squadron of chocobo-mounted cavalrymen to trample Draco. With only costumed men, it was hard for the scene to come across as serious. This story had an antique feel, yet it was only about twenty years old. Did anyone write stories so cloyingly sentimental anymore?

Form the stage's right wing, Aerith rubbed her temples and poured herself a glass of wine—a fine fortified vintage from the Impresario's personal stock. In lieu of monetary payment, it was his showing of hospitality. Aerith would have thought it a bad idea to dull her senses even a little now, but she needed to take the edge off. She had needed to do it for the better part of… well… what month was it anyhow?

"Can I have a drink?" Tifa said, sitting beside her.

Aerith sipped and waggled a finger. "Ah ah ah."

Tifa's smile was rueful and she fought back tears. "I forgot."

They had not talked about it since their encounter with Cloud.

"Have you thought of a name?" Aerith said.

"I will after I decide whether or not to keep it. If any of us are even alive or the world doesn't end tomorrow."

Tifa watched her with eerie eyes that betrayed nothing of her heart's inner turmoil. She had had a lifetime of masking _that_. "Are you mad at me?"

Aerith tilted her head back and tightened her lips. She was quiet for a thought-collecting minute. "No. I'm not. Let down."

Tifa's eyebrows furrowed.

Aerith stopped her as she prepared to speak. "I don't want to hear your reasons why. I just… don't. I don't even know myself."

The problem with lack of specificity in their conversations of late had at least one critical problem: a great many topics seemed off-limits.

The Impresario entered the wing. "Are you ready?"

Tifa and Aerith sat upright and turned their attention to the stage.

Vincent walked onto the stage through a wooden door. The audience cheered, none the wiser. How the dress fit, none could have guessed. With the exception of their cup, Maria was almost exactly the same size. After months without a cut, Vincent even had her long, black locks.

Vincent would have been deathly pale if not for the rose blush. He sauntered to the fore of the castle set.

Then he sang.

"_Oh my hero,_

_ So far away now,_

_ Will I ever see your smile?_

_ Love goes away._

_ Like night into day,_

_ It's just a fading dream…_"

His voice was, deep, rich, and beautiful, if not irritated.

Aerith and Tifa stared at each other long and hard.

The Impresario watched. His jaw nearly dropped as he listened. "I thought it was a silly idea until I heard the voice in dress rehearsal. But hearing him on stage like this… it's like magic."

Aerith and Tifa turned to him.

"You see, Maria's also a baritone," he said.

Aerith watched Vincent ascend the stairs to the high balcony and pitch his flowers off the imaginary turret into the imaginary moat below. It was a bit clumsy, but that did not seem to overly bother the Impresario.

"Do you think… no… I could never do that to my Maria. But perhaps your Vincent might consider becoming her understudy?"

When Aerith really thought about it, she did not expect Vincent to have much on his plate if they somehow managed to save the world. "I'll run it past him after the show."

Aerith found Vincent's irritability palpable. Then again she was finally open to his emotions. Still, she could not shake the feeling that on some deep level, he sort of liked it. Regardless of his personal feelings, Prince Ralse needed his dance partner. The scene ended to thunderous applause.

The curtain drew. The stage crew carted the bulky superstructure of the castle behind a parallel set of curtains and pulled out the carpeted staircase. Banners dropped from above. Vincent exited stage right. He stood beside Tifa, Aerith and the Impresario for the better part of a minute. He did not speak—just glared. The Impresario was wise enough to hold back on any questions or inquiries he may have had. Then the stage manager prompted Vincent to prepare for the ballroom sequence.

The orchestra struck up a sentimental waltz. Vincent looked strangely helpless; powerless. Extras started into a spirited gait and the curtain ascended.

In hindsight, Aerith was sorry it happened right when it did. She did not even get to see Vincent dance. A trio of men clad in brown and gray vest cut through the orchestra pit, crawling over tubas and woodwinds. They leapt onto the stage and dropped an enormous burlap sack over Vincent's head. He wanted to react. Aerith knew that much.

He also knew the plan.

A few stage hands ran after the men, but the men were large—at least seven feet tall each—and had long legs with agility to match. The bowled past any passers-by and raced out the emergency exit. Doubtless, there was a getaway car outside.

The Impresario walked out onto the stage and calmed the audience. He allowed about ten minutes before ferrying the real Maria onto the stage to the loudest applause yet. No one asked how. It was magic. The Impresario's magic. Vincent's magic. Maria's magic. None in the audience would ever forget the performance, even if the fourth-act plot twist did not make a lot of sense.

When the show resumed more-or-less according to script, the Impresario joined Tifa and Aerith in the wings. Tifa had already gathered her things and was prepared to leave. Aerith sat transfixed by Maria's performance. If not for her rich brown eyes, she could have been Vincent's transvestite twin. Regardless, she could certainly sing.

"So…" The Impresario said. "I suppose Don Corneo likes them a bit on the… Um…"

"He likes it any way he can get it," Aerith said.

That was the truth.

* * *

A miasma of dust and debris hung in the dark air. This place never recovered from the calamity. The fuzzed, spotty brown light fueled by the backup generator kicked in and out. It was like this in all of the neighborhoods with Shinra facilities. "Corneo is trying to choke us out," he heard the Public Safety men whisper while they thought he slept.

Only there were no Public Safety men now. They patrolled the hallways past his cell twenty-one times every hour. He timed it once before the clock above the holding cell door stopped. Now no one came. No one had for what may have been minutes or may have been hours. He hoped he might at least die a martyr. No. He would die abandoned and forgotten.

The lights failed. Whether it was night or day, he could not tell. He had long-since lost track of which twelve hour cycle he was on. Since the power failed, night and day were the same inside the detenion facility. They were the same in the underground plate.

Barret sat in darkness and waited.

A door opened outside. A faint motorized hum like the buzzing of a bee started at the end of the hall and drew closer. Barret clutched his sheets with his remaining hand—his bad arm amputated even higher than before and left a bandaged stump. The buzzing bee sound stopped at his door. Barret awakened from a fog of weeks or months and watched his cell door slide open to an even deeper pit of darkness.

"Barret?" a strange, familiar voice said: an eerie recording in which the pitch was right but the inflection was all wrong.

"Who are you?"

"You know who I am."

Barret squinted. The hallway's black gave way to dark gray. He shifted back. He had heard the guards tell the story of the fall and he spoke without filtration "That's fuckin' impossible."

"You'd be amazed by all of the things that are possible Barret."

"You're supposed to be dead."

"You would be now too. You should thank your friends for being such a good distraction."

"How did you get in here?"

"I had a little help. You see, I'm not as resourceless as you might think, given my circumstances." A tall, bestial form stepped into view, next to the hunched figure's side.

"So you have things made now, I guess. I suppose we're going to act like none of this happened and you're gonna help me get outta here?"

"Not quite yet. I'm only trying to be practical. I thought maybe we could make a deal."

"If I could punch the snot out of you right now, I would. I've been in this goddamn cell for so many days I've lost count. I don't owe you shit."

"Fair enough. Then maybe you'd like to rot in this cell. Did I mention it's desserted? I don't think anyone's coming here ever again. You can do without water for a lot longer than you can do without food."

Barret was not sure whether to laugh or cry. "What do you want from me?"

"Your expertise and your connections?"

"The hell you need that for?"

"I have a few friends… granted… but what I want is what you want."

Barret sat on the edge of his bed. "Oh?"

"There's someone in Junon I'm just _dying_ to meet."

The motorized wheelchair drew closer. Beneath a white cloak, blue eyes smiled. The air grew cold.


	26. Chapter 26: I Want to Be Your Canary

**25**

**I Want to Be Your Canary**

The lights flickered off again.

"Un-fucking believable," Reno said.

Tseng flashed his usual "cool it" look.

They flipped on the emergency lanterns. The map of Sector Eight bordered on unreadable with such little ambient light. The two of them sat in tight quarters in the kitchen. This used to be a little Wutainese place known for an unusually well-prepared Marlboro. The attack on Midgar ended its twenty-four years of service. Even after meticulous cleaning, the funk of spoilage still lingered near the empty walk-in refrigerator.

They had been able to piece together fragments of hacked surveilance footage. They knew Cloud Strife was responsible, but the path of destruction exceded the capabilities of a mere SOLDIER First Class. Sephiroth had been replaced.

Tseng's PHS rang. Tseng glanced at the number. It was Scarlet again. He did not answer.

Whatever blew up Shinra Tower, it was not Cloud. There were not a lot of things it could have been. Almost all of them had something to do with Scarlet.

When Tseng did not answer, his PHS rang again immediately. Reno accepted that he might well spend the last days of his life surrounded by the smells of rotten Marlboro.

"What happens when we locate the diesel generators?" Reno said.

"We retake them," Tseng said, as though it might be as easy as walking into a convenience store and buying a remedy. "They're Shinra property. Don Corneo's not Shinra."

"It woud help if we had more men. I mean… for example, those guys who defected at the Honeybee?"

"Yeah, well, next time you see them you may end up having to kill them."

Reno stared.

"I wouldn't trust men like that anyway," Reno said.

"We're in the 'trust no one' phase of the campaign?"

Tseng smiled. Reno could have anticipated what he said next. "That's what being a Turk is all about anyway."

Someone knocked at the door.

Reno glanced at the surveillance camera. It _looked_ like Rude. He braced a handcuffed man with a paper bag over his head and carried a Public Safety-issued dufflebag. "What do you want?" Reno yelled through the door.

No answer. Just another knock.

"We don't need anymore rotten elixers here," Reno barked.

Rude voice boomed back. "Well your mother's a Wutainese crackwhore."

The password was right, so Reno unlocked the door.

Tseng sighed.

"I brought him. Just like you asked," Rude said.

"How do we know he's not bugged?" Reno asked.

Rude shot him a pithy, "what do you take me for?" look. He pushed his hostage roughly down onto an old wooden chair.

Reno held the electric lamp to his face and pulled off the paper bag. The hostage flinched away from the light. He was young—no more than twenty-five—and red-haired. He wore a white button-down shirt and looked disheveled—stoned even.

Tseng leaned in closer. "So what's your name?"

He was still handcuffed and unable to shield his eyes from the light. He looked away, but would have still been half-blind. "Johnny."

"Do you have a last name, Johnny?" He seemed like the young, naïve sort who vanished in a crowd; would die first in a Public Safety operation.

"I'd rather not say yet."

Tseng inhaled. "Do you know who I am?"

"Tseng. Leader of the Turks."

"If I'm Tseng then what am I doing here in the slums of Sector Eight in the middle of a blackout? Why aren't I in Junon right now?"

"I'm guessing you know what Scarlet did when Cloud attacked Midgar." Johnny was a talker when he got nervous. "I know you accessed the data, in fact. You hacked into the encrypted security cam data that backed up to the Junon mainframe six minutes before Shinra Tower blew."

Tseng arched an eyebrow.

Rude gave a slight nod. This one said, "See? I told you."

"What do you do, Johnny?" Tseng said.

"I work in systems analysis at Junon," Johnny said.

"What reason would I have to hack into the Junon mainframe? I have the third highest security clearance in all of Shinra."

"Because you didn't want to have your access logged. So you cracked the firewall with an anonymous IP. It wasn't hard to figure out though."

Tseng took in his words. He glanced at the dufflebag in Rude's hands.

"Scarlet fired the Sister Ray," Johnny said. "The President was still alive. So was SOLDIER First Class Jecht. She's tried to cover up as much as she could about what happened. Most people were so distracted by the chaos, it hasn't been hard."

"Those are serious accusations. Why would she do something like that?"

"As head of the Department of Weapons Development, pending a replacement for the head of Public Safety, she's the leader of Shinra. But you know all of that. That's why you, the Turks, haven't gone public. She has all the power now."

Tseng clasped his palms together.

Johnny squinted harder. "Um. Can you get that lamp away from my eyes?"

"What are you doing here then? Why come to us?" Tseng said. "If what you're saying is true, you're in a very dangerous position right now."

"Because I can't sit with this any longer. Besides. My friends are in danger."

_Curious_. Tseng turned to Rude. "What's in the dufflebag?"

Rude withdrew… _it_. Tseng had seen it many times before in briefings, but never so close-up. It really was sort of… cute.

Tseng nodded to Reno.

Reno lowered the lamp.

Johnny's eyes adjusted to the dark room.

Tseng let him see his face. "Start talking."

* * *

The thugs dropped Vincent hard onto the hardwood floor. He could not tell for sure where he was, but the titter of voices in a nearby room and the jingle of a player piano provided a few hints.

When Vincent fidgeted in the sack, he heard one of the thugs laugh. "You're feisty. They all are. Until Coreno gets to them."

Vincent really wished he could just kill them now. But no, he had work to do and he promised Aerith he would do it her way. He could not say why he trusted her so. At first, he wanted her unique contribution to the genepool. Afterwards, he desired her. Now he knew she could never reciprocate those feelings. He no longer had anything to gain from her. She saved his life, yet he did not feel obliged to her. Not really.

On some level, Vincent knew why he followed them—why he followed _her_. Such thoughts bothered him.

When Don Corneo's henchmen left and closed the door behind them, he crawled out of the sack and took in his surroundings. The air was smokey. He had not been inside any buildings in Midgar since their arrival except for the old opera house. He saw from their approach most buildings seemed dark. This one was fully lit—almost too bright, as though gloating in its own brightness.

Vincent had never been in the Honeybee Inn before. Just the same, he knew this was it without question.

Of course, now that he was here, it had not occurred to him what he would do next. If he were Aerith, he could locate the old woman and the little girl in a heartbeat. He had not had her power for a long time. He was broken.

Aerith and Tifa would have a plan. They would have some strategy. He felt fortunate to have made it through most of his long life without needing much of a plan.

Vincent brushed off the white lace dress. It was form-fitting with a par of… artificial additions. Vincent unbuttoned the colar and reached in. If the Impresario had not had such a modest outfit, this never would have worked.

The door opened again. One of the theater ruffians walked back in, perhaps having forgotten something. He saw Vincent and went bug-eyed.

The padding Vincent had to wear was just big enough to hide a three-chambered pistol and he was drawing it at that very moment.

Vincent stared. _There's nothing to see here. Move along._

Don Corneo's lackey walked away and closed the door behind him.

Still no plan, but urgency now.

There was a ventilation duct overhead. This never worked except in movies. Fortunately, most cinema heroes lacked blue magic.

* * *

Elmyra lay in bed. She did little else anymore. There was no real reason to leave it. There was a tiny bathroom adjoining and no one ever let them out. They only ever saw other human beings at meal time now and even then it was just one of Don Coreneo's minions dropping off a scant tray of food. Marlene painted away on a canvas. Her images were vibrant and fantastical—here a sparkling rainbow and here a dragon or unicorn. It was the opposite of anything she had seen for many months. One of the friendlier girls helped smuggle them in until the corpulent hag who ran the day-to-day operations here punished her. At least that was what Elmyra gathered. No one talked to her anymore. Her days were spent in the presence of an unrealistically optimistic little girl and five shades of beige linens and wallpaper. The destruction of the mako reactors notwithstanding, nothing changed here. Not ever.

Not until about ten minutes ago. Mumblings became cacophonous until men… Don Corneo's men… trampled up and down the halls.

Elmyra did not dare to stir. She would not herself even suspect the commotion had anything to do with her.

Marlene sat up at attention. She focused on the air ducts. The grate rattled and clattered and then dropped to the floor.

A swirling black mass swooshed in and materialized in front of them. It took form. Human form. Then it spoke in a low, sultry voice. "There's no time to explain. I'm Vincent Valentine. We met once before when I was Turk, but I'm on your side now. I'm here to rescue you. Aerith Gainsbough and Tifa Lockhart will be waiting for us outside in a few minutes."

Marlene stared. "Why is he wearing a dress, Auntie Elmyra?"

Elmyra's mouth opened and then closed again. "Aerith? My Aerith is still alive?"

Marlene perked up. "And Daddy? My Daddy?"

Vincent stared at the child and stammered. She looked surprised and then hurt. Even without saying a word, he betrayed the beginnings of a lie. "We should go."

Elmyra sat up and hobbled out of bed. Vincent caught her when she nearly tumbled to the ground. She watched him. She recognized him. She remembered the hostage crisis at her home. Vincent dodged her gaze. "If Aerith trusts you… How is she?"

Vincent surveyed his surroundings. "Different. In a good way. She's all grown up now."

Elmyra smiled a tired smile. _It's about time._

"Could you crawl through the air ducts?" Vincent asked.

Elmyra hesitated; glanced up at the high air duct. "Take Marlene. Take the girl. Don't worry about me."

Vincent shook his head. "I told them I would take both of you."

"I'm old and she's all that matters."

Marlene watched the conversation with wide eyes.

Vincent scowled. "I see where Aerith gets her stubbornness now. I'll carry you both if I have to."

The door unlocked and then opened. It was one of Don Corneo's men. The one with the roaming hands who almost discovered Vincent's secret on the long, bumpy trek to the Honeybee Inn.

The henchman gaped.

Vincent _really_ wanted to shoot him. Instead, he grabbed Elmyra and Marlene, throwing one over each shoulder. The world blurred and they vanished out of sight. They swirled and spun in a blot of amorphous ink and materialized back in the storage room from which Vincent escaped. He knelt low and pressed Elmyra and Marlene lower to the floor. Now Elmyra really did fall down. Both seemed equally surprised by the sudden transportation and neither one seemed ready to comment except for a grumble.

Vincent looked out the half-open door and saw armed men running while startled or bemused brothel girls looked on.

"How do we get out?" Elmyra asked.

Vincent shook his head. "Aerith and Tifa have a plan."

Or did they?

Vincent may have taken for granted the fact that they both seemed so much more organized than he; that he preferred to avoid plans; fly by the seat of his pants and they seemed so different from him. Aerith never specifically said how they would get him out of the Honeybee Inn. He just assumed.

Don Corneo's men went from room to room. He coud hear the footsteps approaching their own.

Vincent waited in silence and then it occurred to him: for the first time in over a human generation, he trusted someone. He depended on someone.

It scared the hell out of him.

The cracked door opened all the way. Vincent recognized the warty man with cropped blond hair from the photos in the Shinra archive. He always wore something as ostentatious as this robe of red-dyed fur in his public appearances. The men at his side were dressed more conservatively in navy blue business suits, not that Vincent cared much how they dressed. He was more concerned by their pistols.

Don Corneo snarled. "What, pray tell, is going on here?"

That was when the explosion hit.

A rumble shocked the entire building. Chunks of debris and rubble tumbled through the air and three of Don Corneo's men fell. Shrieks filled the air along with a sulfurous sting. Don Corneo and his men turned and ran into the center of the cloudy hall.

"You!" Don Corneo shrieked. "What do you want here?"

A feminine cackle echoed through the suddenly-drafty building.

It was decidedly not Tifa or Aerith.

Marlene shrieked and crawled to a corner. Elmyra followed after her. Vincent peered around the door frame. The scandalously-dressed blonde stood triumphant on a mass of rubble, clutching an enormous fan in one hand and a Public Safety-issued machine gun in the other. "Keeping something from me, have you, Corneo?" she cried.

"Damn you, LeBlanc!" he cried in return, "scrounge up your own diesel generators."

She smirked. "You seem to think you can control Midgar, but Midgar isn't your city. Midgar isn't anyone's city." Two alike-dressed men, one incredibly fat and one incredibly slim, flanked her. Behind her, a small army of women in orange jumpsuits with veiled faces.

What was she wearing anyway?

"Get them! For Midgar!" she screamed. The LeBlanc syndicate marched ahead, guns firing with abandon.

So this was definitely not part of Aerith's plan.

Marlene screamed. Elmyra held her close. "What in heaven's name is going on, Vincent?" Elmyra cried.

Vincent shook his head. "I don't know, but we have a shot to get out of here…"

The door burst down. One of Don Corneo's men stumbled backwards, on top of Vincent. One of LeBlanc's goons tackled him. All three tumbled around on the ground. Vincent pushed one away and the other punched. The chaos spread in the main room. Someone threw a grenade. The stairway to the second floor collapsed.

Don Corneo shrieked. "Get them!" Vincent had no idea whom he was talking about until two of his suited men entered and grabbed Elmyra and Marlene. They dragged both away screaming.

Vincent snarled at the two figures wrestling him on the ground. Then Don Corneo and his men disappeared around a corner.

The Galleon Beast emerged.

Vincent marched across the shredded remains of his assailants.

The fighting dissipated. The drum roll of gunshots diminished to a synchopated beat. Don Corneo's men were dead or retreating. Everyone stopped and stared at the monster emerging from an inconsequential supply room.

Vincent roared a terrible roar.

LeBlanc stumbled backward, but recovered after a moment. "Fire!" she cried.

Vincent plowed past her footsoldiers, trampling and goring, scanning his surroudings; unable to find any trace of Don Corneo, Elmyra, or Marlene. If he only had his Goddess-given powers as a Cetra—his birthright—he would know their location immediately.

The bullets stung. Then they slowed him. Then they reduced him to a bleeding heap before he had killed half a dozen of his attackers. There were at least a dozen more still standing.

The powers Vincent retained had never felt more useless.

"Vincent!"

It was Aerith. She and Tifa crawled into the building through the gaping hole left by LeBlanc's charges. They ran towards him. The fiery vision of the Galleon Beast faded to one more human. He was alive, but depleted. While his friends ran towards him, a dozen rifles bore down on him. For the first time in his centuries of life, it occurred to him he was about to die. It was a stark, scary thought. Maybe his would be a noble death, but it would cap a life of selfishness and collusion.

It was too late for regret. Vincent stood tall, ready to accept the bullets with pride.

Another explosion shook the building—this one from the main entrance—this one small. It was just a charge large enough to take down the door.

"_Freeze, everyone stay where you are._" Vincent recognized the commanding voice through the megaphone. No one else he knew could freeze a room of armed thugs so quickly.

Vincent heard Reno's voice before he saw him. "Fuck, is that you? Hey, Tseng, it's the newbie."

Tseng pushed past a row of Public Safety Infantrymen with guns trained on LeBlanc and her henchmen. "_Vincent?_"

Vincent did not see her, but he felt a flicker of light; of energy; of _her_. When Aerith wrapped her arms around him, he could hear the whisper of her spirit. _Thank you for being safe._ He crumpled to the floor.

She healed him. He basked in her glow. He felt her compassion even if it was not love as he knew it. Time passed and when his eyes opened, he saw her smiling eyes. He glanced to his left and he saw Tifa. Only she was not smiling. She was not even looking at him. Her eyes were locked onto someone else.

Reno was not looking at her. Not looking her in the eye anyway. "So… want me to forgive you for getting me shot?"

Tifa seemed about ready to pounce and snap his neck. That was how forgiving she looked.

Rude and about a dozen infantrymen were busy arresting LeBlanc and her goons. She was protesting loudly. Aerith watched the scene with a look of grim satisfaction. It subsided when she returned her attention to Tseng. The remaining Public Safety men aimed their rifles at them.

"Stand down," Tseng said.

The Infantrymen complied and lowered their weapons.

Tifa's eyes narrowed. "You're not going to arrest us?"

Tseng inhaled and straightened his back. He did not like doing this. "No. I'm not. I'm afraid we have bigger fish to try. Several."

Tifa offered a questioning look.

"It's been a while, Tifa," a less familiar voice said.

He emerged from the line of Public Safety men. Vincent did not recognize the man with stark red hair, but he did recognize the black and white mechanical cat cradled in his arms.

Tifa approached him and glanced at the Cait Sith robot. She smiled. "You could have just told me, Johnny."

His smile was wry. "No, I couldn't… but thanks."

Aerith watched him too. Her stare was long and pensive. "We've met before…"

Was he blushing? "We saw each other for a minute in Costa Del Sol. I was on vacation. Actually, I was deploying a new Cait Sith."

Aerith shook her head. "I know that… but… now that I see you here… I feel like we met somewhere before that…?" She surveyed the remnants of the Honeybee Inn.

"So I'm glad we finally found you," Johnny said, too quickly. "I want to tell you all so much. The truth. But…"

Aerith stood up. "Marlene and Elmyra are through that passageway there…" She nodded between what remained of the stairs to the second floor. "So is Don Corneo."

Tifa stiffened. "We need to do this."

"Stay back," Tseng said. "This is Turk business. Those were our hostages. We have a score to settle."

Aerith walked to the door. "No. Let me do the talking."

Reno gaped. "Who the hell is that and what did she do to Aerith Gainsborough?"

Tseng ignored him. "Reno. Rude. With me." He gave Tifa a questioning look.

Tifa eyed Reno with trepidation. "I'll do worse than shoot you if you get in the way." She tapped the Murasame strapped to her back and followed after Aerith.

Reno's lips stretched from ear to ear. "I think she digs me."

Vincent stood and brushed off his dress. He filed in line behind Tifa. "If only you knew, Reno…"

Tseng sighed and followed with Rude.

They walked through a pair of massive double doors. The room was ambient red—a red of joy and blood. Unlike the rest of the Honeybee Inn, Don Corneo constructed it in the Wutai style. Wutainese characters in bright gold lined the ceiling panels and walls. Ceramic pots, some bigger than them, rested in the corners and banners with serpentine dragons lined the wall. Vincent had seen Wutai years before. Wutainese art and architecture were spare and functional. This was Wutai's beauty, but without its purpose and utility—an idealized corruption of an endangered culture. Not that Don Corneo had ever been bothered by corruption in any of its senses.

He panted and whimpered, cowering in a corner. The barrel of his pistol pressed to Marlene's temple. Drying tears streaked her cheeks, but she did not utter a single noise. In Don Corneo's other arm, he held Elmyra in a headlock. Aerith took a few steps forward.

"Don't move," Don Corneo whined. "Don't move or I swear to all that's sacred I'll kill her."

Aerith stalled. "What is sacred, Corneo?" she asked.

He gave her a strange, frightened look. "What?"

"Your life? Is your life sacred? Because if you hurt one hair on that girl's head, you'll die. It doesn't have to end this way."

His wide eyes teared. The Don of Sector Six was afraid. "Nothing's sacred. Nothing at all."

Vincent could imaine the words coming out of his own mouth.

"It's over, Corneo," Tseng said. He shifted his weight. His hand slid closer to his own pistol.

Marlene let out a faint gasp. The gun's barrell pressed harder.

Tseng relaxed his hand. He looked pained. It was out of character.

Aerith shot Tseng a look and stepped forward again.

"Stay back," Don Corneo said. "It's not over. It will never be over. Don't you get it? This city has belonged to me for years. It was my birthright. It's finally mine. I'm not about to watch it crumble away. Don't you get it? It's always been me who's given the people what they've wanted." He eyed Vincent in his dress ruefully. "I wanted to give the city anything it wanted. I finally have the power to do that. You think Rufus Shinra ever gave a shit about the people who live here? About anyone who wasn't himself?"

"You can't get away with giving some people what they want at the expense of others' lives and freedom."

"That's what Shinra did for generations," Vincent said.

Aerith turned. "And now here we are."

"All of you, stay back," Don Corneo whined.

Aerith raised her hands in surrender, calm and disarming. "I don't want you to get hurt. If you give us Marlene and Elmyra right now, no one will hurt you."

Vincent caught the flicker of a shape behind Don Corneo. He panted and gasped. His gun dropped away from Marlene for the better part of a second.

Then Vincent realized. The whole time, Aerith was stalling for time.

The man moved with surprising stealth, creeping along the perimeter of the room, dodging between pottery and banners until the last possible second. The floor creaked.

Don Corneo turned with a start just in time for the man to bring the head-sized ceramic Wutainese bowl down on his head.

Don Corneo fell, bleeding and unconscious.

Marlene and Elmyra scurried away. Aerith caught them in her arms and squeezed.

Vincent stared. The strange man stood with triumph.

Aerith smiled at him. "I knew you were there. Thanks so much… um…?"

His face darkened. "Biggs."

Tifa looked perplexed long enough to further darken the long-lost AVALANCHE-member's face.

"You _did_ remember I was taken captive with Marlene and Elmyra, didn't you both?" he asked, something of a whimper in his voice.

Johnny entered from the double doors. "I knew you'd pull through for us, buddy. Put her there!"

Biggs stared. "Okay, do I know you?"

Tifa came to his rescue. "Biggs, this is Cait Sith's handler, Johnny. He was a childhood friend of mine."

Biggs arched an eyebrow.

Vincent rolled his eyes. Tifa certainly was popular.

"You grew up with Tifa and Cloud?" Biggs asked.

Johnny nodded. "I've been working at Shinra for the last couple of years. When I heard about AVALANCHE, I thought I could help out from the inside, you know?" His eyes cut to Tseng. "Uh…?"

Tseng shook his head. "We need to talk. All of us. We're going to need more privacy."

* * *

A bright neon sign of nonsense words that blended in with all of the others in this dilapidated part of Sector Eight hid the Turks' ad hoc base in plain sight. It reminded Tifa of Seventh Heaven. She never imagined she would miss bartending for lecherous, drunk criminals. The past several months changed her mind about a lot of things.

The Turks: Tseng, Reno, and Rude, sat in a cluster. Biggs, Tifa, Aerith, and Johnn sat across from them. Elmyra huddled by Marlene, draped in a long shawl, asleep. Both were emotionally spent.

Vincent sat alone and to the side. Both Turk and AVALANCHE and yet neither. "You mean to tell me…" he seethed, "You never had a plan?"

"Well…" Aerith said, "I thought I could make it up as we went. You seem to be fine having done that for so long."

Vincent looked away, hurt.

"You didn't have a plan, exactly, but you're selling yourself short," Tifa told Aerith. "LeBlanc's arrival was as shocking to us as anyone. But the cavalry was your idea."

Vincent glanced over.

Johnny leaned forward, still clutching his inert Cait Sith doll, as though it gave him power here. "I got in touch with Tseng because Aerith told me to, Vincent."

Tseng scowled and folded his arms.

Johnny smiled. It would have been charming if it were not so awkward. "I knew the three of you were closing in on Midgar and…"

Tifa held up her hands. "Hold on. How did you know we were close to Midgar?"

"The same reason I knew when to meet you in Costa Del Sol," Johnny said. "Those teardrop earrings you always wear, Tifa? They have a GPS tracking device."

Now it was Tifa's turn to be taken aback.

"I called Aerith's PHS when I figured she was in cellular range. I was in Midgar to investigate the incident with… Cloud." Johnny balked at the words.

Tifa's face blanked.

"So it's true?" Aerith said.

Johnny nodded. "I saw the footage. Scarlet blew up Shinra Tower with the Sister Ray to take him out and Rufus at the same time."

A knot formed in Tifa's throat. Aerith wanted to say some consolation, but what? "Maybe he's okay, Tifa," as though that were a good thing?

"Shinra's in ruin here in Midgar and with Scarlet in control of Junon, she's the _de facto_ ruler of Shinra," Johnny said.

"And the free world," Tseng said. "So you said Aerith told you to contact me?"

Johnny nodded. "I told her everything I knew. And I knew the Turks were not reporting to Scarlet. So Aerith told me to approach you, Tseng."

Tseng's scowl hardened. He looked directly at Aerith. "And you trust me… why? We've imprisoned you twice. We had a spy placed among your friends. We were complicit in Rufus lying to you about freeing your mother at Cosmo Canyon."

Aerith looked hard at Tseng. She remembered those eyes through the haze of years. She remembered them shining through the darkness of her days with Hollander as a child. She remembered the consciences following her in the aftermath of the Nibelheim incident when she most alone in her entire life. Those consciences never seemed a threat to her. The Turks protected her in a time when she may have needed it most.

The other question Aerith did not ask: why did he trust her? After all, he had just taken her and several accused terrorists into their base of operations. She never asked because she already knew the answer. He knew her.

"I just trust you," Aerith said.

Tseng nodded once. "What happened to Sephiroth and Cloud?" He studied the Masamune across Tifa's lap

Aerith recounted their journey to Icycle Inn, editing out details he did not need to hear: like Reeve's death and just about everything that happened in the Gold Saucer and Costa Del Sol.

"He's not dead, is he?" Tseng asked.

Aerith shook her head. "I don't know for sure, but I doubt it."

"Then we need you. We need the White Materia just in case."

Aerith swallowed. "I don't have it anymore. Cloud destroyed it."

Tseng's stare was painfully long. He turned his gaze upward.

"I think we know where the Black Materia is though," she added. "Hojo has it."

Tseng shook his head. "That's not possible. They strip-searched him."

"Then he at least knows where it is."

"And if Cloud's alive, he knows too," Tifa added. "We figured it out right before he changed."

Tseng nodded. "Well… it sounds like we know what comes next."


	27. Chapter 27: Lucrecia Crescent

**27**

**Lucrecia Crescent**

Barret Wallace missed his arm. He still felt it tingle and twitch though doctors had amputated it below the elbow years before and above the elbow only months before. It was his arm that led him to believe in ghosts. It ached when he was feverish and felt chilled to the bone on a cold night though it was long-since gone. It made Barret understand how so many that had come before and passed on might have a lingering presence. Telah reaffirmed his hatred of Shinra when it waned. The sight of Shears' corpse never left his memory. Not for a day. He wanted to believe Dyne lived on in Marlene, but he was not so optimistic. His experience pointed to the existence of, like his arm, vengeful, restless spirits.

Junon's skyline crept closer.

The brunette woman in red nodded. "That's the Sister Ray."

"I know that," Barret grumbled. "I been there just a few months ago."

"Touchy," said her hulking companion. He was Azul the Cerulian. His friend (if they truly were friends) was Rosso the Red. Apparently soldiers of Deepground favored redundant names.

"He has had a tough couple of months," the white-cloaked figure said.

Barret glanced around. An old friend of Tellah's drove the buggy. He had made a few calls and managed to scrape together a motley crew of about dozen. They were scrappy and malnourished. The best he could come up with. They barely fit in the stolen garb of Public Safety infantrymen. They would not have been his first choices to lead an operation—willing to follow a crippled has-been to near-certain death.

But then, times were tough.

"Where's Marlene?" Barret asked, as if the answer this time would be any different than any of the other times he asked.

"You'll see in good time."

"I wouldn't have thought you'd have an in with Deepground remnants," Barret said.

The cloaked figure smirked. "You'd be surprised."

Barret fidgeted; crossed his legs and then uncrossed them. The buggy hopped and skipped over a rough patch of ground. "So what were you two just doing this whole time?"

"Waiting," Azul said. He nodded to the cloaked figure. "For him."

"We're the last who still remember," Rosso said.

Barret waited for an elaboration that did not come. "Remember what?"

"What Deepground is and why it was founded," Azul said.

"You're SOLDIERs, aren't you?" Barret asked.

"No," Rosso said. "But we were the last to be treated with Mako."

"What is this Deepground for then?" Barret said.

"You should ask him," Azul said.

Barret turned to the cloaked figure.

Blue cat-slit eyes watched Barret.

"_Even if the morrow is barren of promises  
Nothing shall forestall my return.  
To become the dew that quenches the land,  
To spare the sands, the seas, the skies  
I offer thee this silent sacrifice._"

* * *

"Put me down, asshole," the woman in the burlap sack cried.

Reno smirked. "That any way to talk to a gentleman?"

He dropped her hard on the wooden floor. Vincent seemed disinterested. Biggs, Johnny, Tifa, and Aerith watched with dropped jaws.

Tseng glared at Reno. "I asked you to bring her to me. Was this really necessary?"

"She got a little feisty," Reno said. "I like 'em feisty." He waggled his eyebrows at Tifa.

Tifa tried to look unimpressed, working hard to surpress a smile.

Tseng gestured to Rude. Rude hefted Cissnei out of the bag. She was hog-tied. Completely immobilized.

"No way you did this all by yourself, Reno," Rude said.

Reno shrugged. "Some girls just can't take their chloroform."

Tifa grimaced this time.

Aerith registered the appearance of the "sympathizer" from Junon. "You."

Cissnei looked at her with pure hate. Any semblance of civility upon their first contact was, more apparently than ever, a farce. "Look here. If it isn't Zack's little plaything. He ever tell you about that vacation three years ago to the beach…?"

Aerith folded her arms.

"Cissnei." It was Tseng. "You've got a lot of nerve, AWOL at a time like this. If you can't tell, our numbers are a bit depleted. And spying on us to boot. Did you really think we wouldn't catch up with you eventually?"

She struggled against her bondage to no avail. "I'm not AWOL. Scarlet called me away. She's your supervisor now. You'd do well to remember that."

Tseng leaned in closer. "Was she any good?"

Cissnei looked genuinely taken aback. As much as she could prone on the floor and tied up at least. "What?"

"Was she any good? You know. We all know how she got the top of Weapons Development."

Her voice squeaked. "Go to hell, Tseng."

"So it's true. You didn't used to be this uppity. You had your little ambitions, but you knew your place in the world." Tseng said.

Aerith and Tifa glanced about, hoping to find some way to excuse themselves.

"And what's your excuse, Tseng? You're a Turk. We all are. We belong to Shinra. Why should you care who's in charge? Or don't you just want power yourself?"

Tseng knelt down beside her. "Shinra can go to hell with its blown up power reactors. Do you really want to know what I want?"

Cissnei never stopped struggling. "Enlighten me."

He said it plain-faced—without irony. "Justice."

Cissnei stammered. "With all the blood on your hands, how can you say that?"

"I never said I was a saint. I never said we haven't done lots of things we shouldn't have. I did them for Rufus and his father. Maybe I shouldn't have. But like hell Scarlet's earned the right to tell me what to do. For your information, you want to know who else thought Scarlet owed him something? SOLDIER First Class Jecht."

Cissnei shut her mouth tight.

"There's one more thing," Tseng said. "I want to make sure if Jenova isn't dead yet, it dies and stays dead." He nodded to Aerith. "She may be the only one who can stop it now."

Cissnei looked away. Tears welled at the corner of her eyes.

Tifa and Aerith stood and walked to the door.

Reno shot them a pointed stare. "Leaving?"

"Just getting some air," Tifa said. "Something smells rotten here."

Aerith followed her out.

The air was still stale. It was not as dark here as Sector Six. Rolling blackouts would be the new normal here. Tseng secured the generators: now guarded by _bona fide_ Public Safety men. They were nowhere near strong enough to power all of Midgar. Nothing was anywhere near powerful enough for that. Nothing should have been.

Tifa and Aerith watched each other without words.

Vincent emerged from the condemned restaurant. "Tseng really is like that, you know. He's not just putting on airs."

Tifa's eyes narrowed. "The Turks are spies and hitmen and worse."

Vincent shrugged. "Guilty as charged."

"And you expect me to believe all of this being about 'justice?'"

"Maybe you shouldn't have had your friend contact him then."

Tifa glanced at Aerith.

"I trust him," Aerith said. Before Tifa could object, she added, "I trusted you, didn't I?"

Tifa smirked and tilted her head back. "You got me. Didn't you?"

Vincent frowned.

Rude exited the builing. He acknowledged the three. "She'll get us there."

Vincent studied him. "How?"

"The same way she got here. The Highwind's docked on Station Three. We're taking her at dawn."

* * *

Aerith could not sleep. She knew she should have told her mother, but thought it best not to worry her. Marlene was an unusually sensitive girl and she had experienced enough loss already. She knew she and her mother would argue, so instead, she walked. And walked. And walked. Before she knew it, she had traversed whole sectors.

She did not sleep—just laid in her bed of lilies. They missed her. They needed water. Yet they survived somehow. Weeds poked through cracks in the pavement. Saplings lined the edge of her cathedral. They lived on without her. They were not the only flora she had seen since her return to Midgar, and that was astonishing in its own right.

Aerith heard her and felt her before she saw her.

Tifa peered down at her. "I followed you."

"I can see that," Aerith said.

Tifa sat next to her. "It's beautiful. Everything about this place. What religion was this cathedral made for?"

"My own. Sure, it wasn't built just for me, but I've claimed it as my own."

Tifa looked up through the hole in the ceiling. During the day, it allowed in light. It allowed in more light ever since the day Zack collapsed part of the roof. "Flowers and the starry sky," Tifa whispered.

Aerith followed Tifa's gaze. "It's amazing. I've never been able to see them so clearly before. There was always too much smog. Too much light pollution."

"Would the world be better without us? I've been wondering. I figured you above anyone would know."

"No. I don't believe so anyway. We, humans, weren't created on this world. We're Gaia's adopted children. We share the same lifeforce as the flowers. The plants. The trees. The Cetra. Vincent may well be the last, but they live in all of us. Whether they would have wanted to or not."

Tifa watched the stars. Unknown moments passed. "I thought of a name," she finally said. "Two. One if it's a boy and one if it's a girl."

Aerith sat with her words. "It's a boy. I think it will be a boy."

"I hope he has Cloud's eyes."

"Yeah."

"I'm a little bit afraid. Cloud was infected with Mako and that's how Jenova got to him. I'm a little bit afraid for my child, but I promised myself I'll love him. I'll love him until I die. I'll love him even if he turns into a monster when he grows up."

"Tifa?"

"Yes?"

"All children do. It's called puberty."

"Har, har."

"You'll make a good mother. A better one than I would have ever made."

"You're still young. You may yet."

Aerith shook her head. "No. I won't. I never wanted anyone's children but Zack's. It's a scary feeling. I found the one. Then I lost him. I resolved I'd be a spinster on the day I knew he'd died."

"Life doesn't always work out the way you planned it." Tifa shifted closer. Aerith felt her hot breath against her cheek. "I wouldn't have thought I could live without him. He's been a part of me for my entire life." Tifa's hand clasped hers and squeezed. "Sometimes you have to let go."

Aerith sat upright. "You think I don't know that?" She rubbed her temples. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean for that to sound so barbed. I'm just… frustrated. And confused. And wondering what it is I'm feeling."

Tifa sighed. "I am too. This is just what I do. If I'm uncertain about something, I do everything I can to quash it. I doubt my duties as the mayor's daughter? I run off to live in the mountains with a famed martial-artist. I see the dark side of Shinra? I join a terrorist organization bent on bringing it down. I've never done anything in moderation. I've never gone half-way with anything."

"And I never took a chance in my life until I met you."

"We're pretty fucked up, aren't we?"

Aerith laid back down. "Yeah."

"I'm sorry," Tifa said. "Again."

"You don't have to be."

"I'm glad I met you."

"And I'm glad I met you."

This time, Aerith let her take her hand. A great distance still existed between them, but for a moment, it did not seem to matter. All that mattered were the beautiful stars and her warm skin.

Aerith felt his presence not far off, but knew he would not want attention drawn.

Vincent watched them rest in silence before walking back to the Turk's base.

* * *

The AVALANCHE members followed the Turks. Tseng held a handcuffed Cissnei by the arm. When Rude said they would take the Highwind at dawn, they imagined more stealth. Tseng marched headlong past a half-dozen bemused Public Safety Infantrymen. He walked tall and confident. No one even attempted to stop him, even when he walked up the boarding ramp. He and Reno drew pistols as they navigated the tight quarters of the airship.

Tseng led them onto the bridge.

Aerith had never been on the bridge before, but she recognized a ship's captain when she saw one. His hair was a shock of blond. He watched their arrival with only one eye. The other was covered by a black patch.

"Commander Gippal, I'm commandeering this ship in the name of the Department of Administrative Research."

He blinked. "Okay. What's up, Tseng?"

"We're heading to Junon. I have a date with Scarlet."

He glaced at Cissnei and smirked. "Who doesn't these days?"

Cissnei glowered.

Tseng did not laugh. "I don't want anyone to get hurt, but it may not be avoidable."

The Captain's smirk faded. "Aye aye, Tseng."

Tseng waved a hand. "Have a seat. This won't be too long a flight, but you should make yourselves comfortable. It may be a while before we can rest again."

Aerith made her way to a cluster of vacant swiveling chairs not far form a series of dials and readouts. The air pressure changed and her ears popped. The morning sun traced a golden line across the Midgar skyline. She could see it all through the giant plate glass windows of the airship. The jagged skeleton of Shinra Tower sat in its middle. Midgar would never be the same again. She might never even see it again.

"What are you thinking about?" Tifa asked from the seat next to her.

Aerith shook her head. "It's beautiful. In a strange, broken way. I've never noticed before."

Tifa nodded. "Yeah."

"It should be about a two hour flight," Johnny said, fidgeting with his Cait Sith doll. "What's the plan?"

Tseng sat by the ship's captain. "Cissnei tells Scarlet we're coming and she lets us into Junon's airspace. Nice and peaceful."

Cissnei still looked miserable.

"Is something the matter, Biggs?" Tifa asked.

Biggs looked lost in thought. He focused on her. "Huh?"

"You've got something on your mind, don't you?"

Biggs shrugged. "It's just… I've never met this Jenova before. So many of AVALANCHE are dead. Cid. Wedge. Yuffie. Even Cloud couldn't stop it. I can't help but feel like… I don't know… I'm not going to make it out of this one, am I?"

Tifa smiled. "You've made it this far, haven't you?"

"Yeah. In captivity. They say zoo animals live a lot longer than ones in the wild. That cuts into their lifespan a lot."

Tifa chuckled. "You can't die, Biggs. You just can't. I'm going to need babysitters."

Biggs nodded. Then a puzzled expression crossed his face. "Huh?"

Aerith glanced at Vincent. He had not spoken to her this morning. He would not even look at her, though he half-turned when she watched him.

"Um…" It was Rude.

Aerith looked at him past Vincent. "Yes?"

"Whatever happens… sorry I broke your PHS," he said.

Aerith smiled.

The flight took as long as Johnny suggested it would. When they were able to perceive the first signs of Junon's skyline, they all knew something was wrong.

"Tseng?" Captain Gippal said.

Tseng clenched his fists and leaned forward in his chair. "I know."

Wisps of black smoke arose from the base of Junon's garrison.

Reno stood. "This is bad, isn't it?"

They were close enough to see the second explosion on the ground.

Barret wired the third set of plastic explosives to the door. Klaxxons sounded all around. Smoke and chaos filled the street. He stepped back and away. One of the AVALANCHE old-timers hit the trigger. A flash of light. A blast of smoke and air. The door gave way. Azul and Rosso burst past him. Azul shouldered a Gatling gun, firing from the hip, seeming at random into the building.

"Which way?" Barret asked.

Rosso seemed surprised for a moment Barret spoke to them. "The little girl's that way." She pointed down the hall. "Take this." She tossed Barret a machine pistol.

Barret stared at the weapon. "What am I supposed to do with it?"

"You'll figure it out," she laughed. "Just don't get yourself killed."

Barret watched the two dash away down the hall.

"You coming, Barret?" one of his men asked. The Shinra uniform was an imperfect fit, but he was amazed at all they were able to pull together such a large scale operation in such little time.

As Rosso and Azul wandered off, Barret cast one final look over his shoulder. Their mutual friend sat in his wheelchair at the door: waiting and watching.

"Won't someone get him?" the fake Public Safety infantryman asked.

Barret shook his head. "Who cares? What does it matter?" He led four men down the hall.

No one mattered anymore but Marlene.

The night after they found Aerith Gainsborough, Tifa confronted him. She told him he needed to change. For Marlene's sake. He did not listen. If there was a Goddess, maybe this was her punishment. All Barret knew was if he were damned, saving her would be his only chance at salvation. She was here. She had to be.

Barret was putting a lot of faith in the cloaked man and he only hope it was earned.

The halls seemed endless. He and the imposters made their way down a long, winding hallway. They passed a flock of bystanders, but these were not hardened Public Safety Infantrymen. They were low-level beaurocrats. The halls took on a rustic wood tone. By the fourth water cooler, it dawned on Barret.

This was not the prison bloc. And he was a diversion.

Boots clicked down to hall coming towards them. These soldiers would not be imposters.

* * *

The Highwind drew closer to the garrison. The Sister Ray's barrel was bigger than anything Tifa could have imagined: she could have fit Seventh Heaven inside. It was longer than than two of Midgar's city blocks. They swooped beaneath it before a handful of midshipmen opened the hatch and dropped the rope ladder.

Tseng checked his gun's magazine and ushered in the Turks and Vincent. "This is it, Gentlemen. We've never stormed Shinra's biggest garrison before, but this isn't any different from anything we've ever done before. I'm hoping Scarlet will listen to reason. We do not know what's going on in there. Do not engage without my order. Are we clear?"

They all barked an affirmative. Except for Cissnei, who stood soberly.

Tifa shouldered the Masamune. "I'm coming too."

Aerith scowled. "Tifa, no."

"I've got to," she said. "They can use all the help they can get."

Reno pointed to the sword. "Can you even use that thing?"

"A week in pure mako and a lot of time spent around Cloud counts for a lot," Tifa said.

Reno and Rude gave each other a quick, amused look.

"If you're coming, remember I'm in charge. Do what you're told," Tseng said. "Those explosions could be anything."

Tifa frowned. "Okay, Tseng."

Aerith took a step closer. Biggs clasped her shoulder.

"She'll be fine," Johnny whispered.

Aerith's eyes welled up. "Be safe. All of you. I'm trying to listen. To feel the planet. And I don't know for sure, but just now… right here…"

"I know," Tifa said.

Vincent ushered in the rear. "We need to go."

Tseng started down the ladder. "Follow me."

They set their feet down along the ceiling of the high command center. It towered above the cliffs and shore and the miniscule buildings below.

Tseng pointed to a hatch. "Rude."

Rude turned a rusty wheel that did not want to be turned. He pulled it open. Tseng gestured to the others to follow down another ladder. The ladder ended in a long corridor and stairwell. Red lights flashed. They heard the alarms and voices booming over the intercom.

Tseng keyed a security code into the door and it opened.

The command center teemed with nervous energy as enlisted men and women bustled from panel to panel. There had never been a breach of security of this magnitude before. It was obvious from the barely-contained panic of everyone in the room. At its center, stood a blonde with stiletto heels and a too-loud red dress that was certainly not Public Safety standard. Without ever having seen her in person, Tifa knew who she was and did not like her.

Half the room remained too intent on their tasks at hand to pay the intruders much mind. The other half turned at their presence immediately. Scarlet was one of them.

Tseng approached her. "We need to talk, Scarlet. This may not seem like the best time, but…"

No one in the combined Turk/AVALANCHE force expected her to respond well to Tseng. None expected her to whip out a gun and shoot him on the spot.

The gunshot echoed and got the attention of everyone else who had not already noticed them. Scattered cries filled the control room. Tseng stumbled backwards against a panel.

Reno fell to his side. Tifa joined him. "Tseng!" Reno cried.

Tseng shook his head from side to side as though shaking off a mild headache. "I'm fine." He offere Tifa a weak smirk. "Kevlar."

Tifa glanced up in time to see Vincent streak across the room. He gripped Scarlet's arm and twisted. She dropped the gun.

Tseng stood with a tweak of his neck. "You've got a lot of nerve, Scarlet. I wouldn't do that if I were you." That last sentence was directed at a pair of techs creeping towards the door.

The techs stopped dead in their tracks. Reno leveling a rifle at them seemed to help.

Scarlet struggled against Vincent to no avail. She watched Tseng with pure hate. "Are you going to shoot me now or later?"

Tseng blinked. She derailed any dramatic speech he had planned. "Huh?"

"You've wanted this job from the start. Why not just get it over with now? Let go of me, asshole!"

Vincent held firm.

Tseng shook his head, a befuddled look on his face. "We don't have time for this. We need to get to the detention bloc, get Hojo, and get out of here."

"On it, Tseng," Reno said.

Vincent let go of Scarlett's arm. "I'm coming too."

Reno grabbed Tifa's arm "You're with us."

Before Tifa could object, he dragged her out the control room and across a long, red-flashing hallway to a set of elevators. They led her in and Reno hit a button. The door closed. Tifa shot him a questioning look.

Reno flashed her a double-take. "What? You may make a nice decoy."

Tifa rolled her eyes. "Great."

The elevator ticked down the floors as they sank deeper into the bowels of Junon's command center.

The elevator clicked after a descent of over forty floors.

Reno shouldered his rifle and Vincent drew his pistols.

"What if the guards don't want to give him up?"

Reno nudged her. "I can be very persuasive, huh?"

"If you only knew how much you didn't stand a chance, Reno," Vincent said.

Tifa stared at Vincent. A realization dawned on her. He knew about her feelings. "How did you…?"

Vincent would not look at her. "I can just feel it."

Tifa wanted to say something. But it was too late for words. The elevator door flung open.

If Tifa was afraid a platoon of Public Safety Infantrymen would intercept them, she was underwhelmed. A trickle of men and women in uniform and plainclothes alike rushed past them form the North end of the hall.

Reno did not have to tell her which way to the detention bloc.

The hallway stretched on. They walked briskly. Then they smelled the horrible stench like burnt circuitry and charred flesh. Then they ran.

Reno did not have to enter a passcode for the detention bloc. It had been forced open. When they turned a corner to the first long series of cells, the guard's body greeted them. Half of it anyway.

Tifa surpressed a swell of bile up her throat.

Reno approached. "What the…?"

Vincent covered his mouth to keep from coughing. Smoke and spent gunpowder stifled the air. "It was that." Vincent pointed to the Gatling gun resting by a second and third Shinra body.

Reno examined the corpses. He looked queasy. "Oh hell… look at that… that big one…"

The body was almost too big to be human and its features reinforced its animalistic appearance. Its hair was a shock of bright blue. By its side was a woman with sweeping red hair. Her eyes were frozen forever in anguish.

Reno shook his head. "Shit."

"Who are they, Reno?" Vincent asked.

Reno stopped short of touching the bodies. "Azul the Cerullean and Rosso the Crimson."

"Someone I should know?" Tifa asked.

Reno shook his head. "Not unless you know much about Deepground."

Tifa hesitated. "The organization Zack was drafted into?"

"Yeah," Reno said. "Genesis Rhapsodos handpicked some SOLDIERs. Zack was a pretty sharp one even then, but he hardly had a chance to get involved in Deepground before Genesis went monkeyshit and took out just about every SOLDIER we had. Azul and Rosso were Deepground's crowning achievement. They've been missing for years. Ever since Genesis died. Quite a feat if you have a look at them."

"They were SOLDIERs?" Tifa asked. They did not look like SOLDIERs.

"Not really," Reno said. "They were genetically engineered creations, infused with Mako."

"Like Genesis…" Tifa said.

Reno gave her a sharp look.

"We ran into Professor Hollander on the Northern Continent," she said.

"We could use some of his knowledge about now," Reno said.

"A little late for that now," Tifa said. "He's dead."

"Man. That blows."

Tifa arched an eyebrow. "Tell me about it."

Vincent studied the corpses. "No gun killed these two. I can't tell what did, in fact. Strange how anyone connected with Jenova and SOLDIER seems to have a rather short life expectancy these days."

Tifa blinked. "Where's Hojo?"

Reno swore under his breath, pulled out his PHS, and ran down the hall.

Less than a minute passed before footsteps approached from the opposte hall. Four infantrymen walked down the hall. They pushed a bound, dark-skinned man ahead of them. He grumbled and swore at them. Tifa caught the word "Marlene."

Tifa ran towards them. The infantrymen aimed their rifles. She stopped. "Barret!"

Barret focused on her. "Teef? The fuck are you doing here?"

"That's my line."

"The bastards got Marlene! I have to help her. Aerith's Mom and Biggs are here too."

Tifa shook her head. "Whoah, what are you talking about? Marlene and Elmyra are safe in Midgar. Biggs is with Aerith nearby. Safe."

Barret's whole body slacked. The infantrymen relaxed, still confused. One stepped aside and put in a call on his radio. He seemed even more confused after the call.

Barret glared at Vincent. "What're you doing with him?"

Tifa's words seemed to mildly surprise Vincent. "He's a friend now."

"How do you know about Marlene and Biggs?"

"We saved them from Don Corneo's yesterday."

Barret seemed to be absorbing it all. "He lied to me. The bastard lied to me. I thought I could trust him. After everything we went through together…"

Tifa's stomach sank. "You were involved in this… how?"

"He freed me in Midgar. He lied to me so he could use me. All this way so I could be a fuckin' diversion."

Reno ran back towards them from down the coridor. "Tseng got Hojo's cell number from Scarlet and the cell door's open. He's gone."

Barret tensed again at the sight of Reno. His guards gripped him tighter, but he did not struggle.

Tifa swallowed. "By the Goddess…"

"I shouldn'ta done it, Tifa," Barret said. "I was an idiot. I knew from the moment I saw him he wasn't the Spike I used to know. I just wanted to believe him so bad…"

"We've got to get back," Tifa said.

Reno's PHS rang. "Hello?" He hung up. "Tseng says we gotta get back up there fast."

They ran, leaving Barret to his jailors.

The sprint down the long, winding hall was interminable. The high speed elevators seemed to be the slowest of her life. With a few floors to go, Tifa's own PHS rang.

"_Tifa?_" It was Aerith.

The elevator doors opened. Tifa strode out, flanked by Vincent and Reno. "What is it?"

"_It's Hojo._"

They entered the control room. Scarlet was no longer being physically restrained. Instead, she stared out the fore plate glass window—the same as everyone else in the control.

He was on the Sister Ray: walking down the barrel, his white prisoner's tunic flapping in the wind.

Tseng glanced at Scarlet. "We need to get a surveilance drone out there."

"Aye, Sir," a tech said.

"Get security down there as soon as possible," Tseng said. "Reno, Rude, we need to get him back…"

Before either could respond, the tech spoke up again. "Sir, you need to look at this…"

A four-meter across monitor flashed on. The drone captured what they could barely see with their naked eyes.

A flickering white blot of white ascended into the air: the charicature of a ghost. A gusy of wind stirred Hojo, nearly pitching him into the bay below and whipped aside the white cloak.

The man flew without the aide of his single, black-feathered wing and looked into the drone's photoreceptor with emotionless cat-slit eyes. His skin and hair were burnt, but healed enough to be recognizable.

"Cloud!" Tifa screamed.

Hojo on one screen regarded Cloud on the other. "So you seem well, my son."

"I'm not your son, Hojo," Cloud said. "But I need something you have."

"Rosso and Azul weren't any more use to you, I take it?" Hojo said.

"I imagined they would complete their task before the poison activated," Cloud said.

"You disliked them that much?" Hojo said.

"They were eager enough to join Genesis in the Otherworld."

Hojo's eyes narrowed. "You're more interesting than I would have thought, Jenova."

Vincent stepped forward. "I want to talk to Hojo, Tseng."

Tseng gave him a questioning look.

"We go back…" Vincent said.

Tseng nodded to the tech who reported, "Audio is on."

"What are you doing, Tseng?" Vincent said.

Tseng wobbled again, but perked up, looking straight into the lense of the second surveillance drone. "Is that you? Why, if it isn't Vincent Valentine."

"Think about what you're doing. He wants to kill you. Everyone on the planet. He's just an ancient biological machine. He's programmed to think by destroying humanity with Holy, he can save the Cetra, but there are no more. All that remain are myself and Aerith Gainsborough who's only have. The Cetra are dead. If Jenova activates Omega weapon and uses Holy, it will be the end of everything. Do you honestly believe Lucrecia would want that?"

"Yes. I know it. She would. And she does."

Vincent stopped.

"_Tifa?_" It was Aerith. Tifa forgot her PHS was still on and set to speaker phone.

Tifa glanced at the Highwind, above and beyond Cloud. "What's up?"

"_Something strange is happening with Hojo down there. I can't explain it…_"

Vincent spoke slow and measured. "Hojo… Where's Lucrecia?"

"Like I once told Cloud," Hojo said. "With me always…"

Hojo pulled off his prison tunic.

Tifa gasped and covered her mouth. Nothing in her long, hard life had prepared her for the horrible thing stitched into Hojo's chest, fore of where his heart should have been.

It was a woman's face. A Cetra's face. Eyes and mouth shut tight, flattened and elongated; disfigured. Hojo laughed.

Mumbling scattered through the command center.

Vincent fell backwards into a seat. "Hojo… what in the name of the Goddess have you done?"

Hojo's eyes smiled straight into the drone. "You're just jealous Vincent. You and Lucrecia were never _this_ close. She still talks to me, you know. She wanted to be with me forever. I'll never be one of the anointed ones. Destined to be born and die a filthy human. But this is as close as I'll ever be."

Tifa pointed. "Is that…"

"What's left of her," Hojo said.

"Why, Hojo?" Vincent asked.

"_Because I told him to._"

The grotesque, stretched eyes opened to reveal dilated pupils. The mouth curled into a smile.

Tifa had never heard Vincent whimper before. "Lucrecia?"

"_It's been a while, Vincent._" her voice was muffled, as though she had swallowed marbles.

Hojo reached into her mouth—into his chest. She opened it for him and he rummaged through. From the corner of her cheek, he pulled out not a marble, but a materia. A materia of obsidian black.

Tseng glowered at Scarlet. "I thought you did a cavity search."

Her gaze was poison. "We knew he was pretty far gone and had experimented on himself. We didn't know those were working cavities."

"Is Tifa there?" Hojo said. "Or Aerith? Or anyone else from your wretched expedition? I wish I could see the look on their faces when they see the whole time they were searching for the damn thing, the Black Materia was just a couple of feet away. With my beloved. Your stupidity astonishes me."

Vincent searched for the words. "Lucrecia… why?"

The face on Hojo's chest smiled, or tried to. It was too badly scarred to make more than a nominal effort. "_Because we're due for a grand reunion. You and me and everyone we've lost along the way. Hojo. Please._"

Hojo held the materia out to Cloud. He accepted it.

Tifa ran to the plate glass window. "Cloud, no!"

Cloud stalled for only a moment. His eyes closed. "It will all be over soon, Tifa."

He drew his Buster Sword and sliced Hojo and Lucrecia in half, cloven down the center. Both symmetrical halves smiled all the way to the ocean surface.

Cloud raised the materia to the sky. A rippling green glow surrounded him. His charred flesh healed. Hair follicles regenerated. He ascended higher and higher. Then he launched into the Western sky like a bullet.

Tifa stumbled down.

Tseng's eyes widened. "By the Goddess, he's going to the Temple of the Ancients, isn't he?"

Vincent stepped towards the plate glass and watched Cloud vanish into the distance. His fists clenched at his side. He eyed Tifa.

Tifa shook her head. "Vincent… I'm so sorry…"

Vincent drew his pistol and fired several shots through the plate glass. "Take good care of her," he told Tifa. Then he vanished in a swirl of light.

* * *

Cloud shot through the air with astonishing speed. Air compressed at his head. A sonic boom exploded into Vincent. He flew on undeterred. Cloud did not know he was coming and that was his advantage. Vincent materialized nearly on top of him. He looked up, stunned, plummeting in speed. Vincent fired his gun straight into Cloud's back. If it had been his heart, he may have won. He may have saved everyone. But he missed. If he had stayed living on in isolation, he may have survived. He may have been the world's sole survivor, in fact. Maybe she would be spared by some quirk of Omega Weapon. But he could never have her. Not really.

And he would have never known love.

Cloud tossed and turned; bobbed and weaved through the air. He tried to toss Vincent aside. His shriek took an inhuman tenor as Vincent shot him again, this shot barely grazing his shoulder.

Cloud accelerated faster and faster, his flight curved and winding until he once again neared mach one.

As Vincent blacked out, he knew he had failed, but he had made Cloud afraid.

Vincent felt it. Then he felt nothing ever again.

The massive, ancient ziggurat awaited Cloud. It had been waiting for him for generations before his birth and would be the last thing standing long after his death, if he died upon completion of this task. The part of Cloud in Jenova did not know. It followed orders. It knew it had to fulfill its sole reason for being at right then, its sole reason for being lay in the shiny black stone in his hands. He flew over the stairs to the zigurat's pinnacle. He saw the embedded pedestal upon which he could put the materia. There was room for two, but only one remained.

A part of Cloud rememberd Tifa's scream from Junon. But that part could not stop his hands from setting the materia in its resting space. The pain caught up to him. Blood pooled at his feet. Even with the Black Materia's healing properties, he knew Vincent nearly killed him. But this was not over. Not yet. For better or worse, it would all end soon.

A wall parted with the whirl of ancient servomotors powered by the soul of an ancient powersource.

A mechanical face of flat chrome, like the smiling and frowning face of dramaturgy emerged with a clunk and a shudder. Lights traced up and down hairline fissures in the temple—ancient wires. Technology on the cellular level fixed the temple's bruises and scars. More whirling motors shifted parts within bigger than Cloud could fathom.

Omega Weapon activated.

The machine woman's eyes lit. A flicker first and then a fire. Their reticles narrowed and focused on Cloud.

It spoke in an ancient tongue Cloud had never before heard, but understood the same. "_You have done well, Jenova._"

Cloud's black wing fluttered when he knelt. "Thank you. Mother."

* * *

_A/N: Tseng waved a hand. "Have a seat. This won't be too long a flight, but you should make yourselves comfortable. We've reached the last save point."_


	28. Chapter 28: Mother

**28**

**Mother**

The world silenced. For the first time in Aerith's life, the voices of the planet stopped—not because she could no longer hear them. No. The planet was speechless.

The reconnaissance jets did not arrive at the Temple of the Ancients right away. Fortunately, even spy satellites could detect an ancient zigurat moving. And that was exactly what it did: crawling and scotting forward the rubble of its centuries-long resting place. Then the jets relayed the video to Junon. Massive uniform blocks morphed into discrete shapes. The central tower protruded up and out from its mass. Turrets at its peripheral jutted down, pushing away dirt and bedrock—lifting the building's superstructure. A wall at its aft forked and lifted its hind-quarters. Stone gave way to form joints. It stood, a corruption of machine and magic.

Then it walked.

"What the fuck is that thing?" Reno said.

Aerith could not draw her eyes away from the monitor. "That's it. That's Omega Weapon."

Tseng and Scarlet gave each other long, measured stares.

"Ready the fleet. Red alert." Scarlet's eyes turned to Tseng. "You know what we have to do, don't you?"

Tseng inhaled. "Yeah."

"Do you trust me?"

"Not even as far as I could throw you."

Scarlet smiled, but only for a moment. "Ensign Tilmitt, prepare the Zeus Cannon."

The female tech balked for half a second before affirming the command. She began typing at her console at a frantic pace.

"What's that?" Tifa asked.

Reno leaned in closer to her. "They say Shinra scrapped its space program. Not really. Its resources were diverted to that. A beam cannon in the sky. Capable of hitting anything; anywhere in the world."

Cissnei glared. "Reno."

"What? Shinra's in ruin and the fuckin' world's about to end. You're gonna get on me about leaking classified information?"

"Reno. Rude. I need you to go with Aerith and Tifa in the Highwind."

Reno and Rude stammered and traded glances.

"If this doesn't work, we're going to need to take that thing head on and even if it does work, we're going to need to clean up," Tseng said. "Only Aerith can tell us whether or not that thing's dead for good. Am I right?"

Aerith pulled her attention away from the monitor. "What? I… I don't know. I think so."

Tseng's gaze seemed to cut straight through her. "Can you do this? Both of you?"

Aerith felt strength in his eyes. She stood straighter. "We can and we will."

Tifa looked back and forth between Omega Weapon; plodding through the jungle with slow, rumbling steps; and Aerith.

Tseng stared at Aerith for another minute. "I'm sorry."

Aerith shook her head. She understood. "You don't need to be sorry, Tseng. But thank you."

Rude rubbed his head. "We'd better go," he said.

Aerith watched the bridge staff as Reno and Rude led Tifa away. Tseng stood side-by-side with Scarlet; Cissnei to her left. The tech began her countdown. "T-minus five…"

Reno grabbed her by the hand and pulled. Then they were gone.

They left the same route they entered, through a secured door and a maintenance hatch. The Highwind hovered overhead, humming audibly: its rope ladder still deployed. They climbed slowly and it moved before they reached the top. To the ship's starboard, a flight of airships ascended: shimmering, vengeful balloons.

Reno and Rude fought over the seat closest to Gippal for all of a minute. Gippal only watched, bemused.

Biggs scowled. Aerith could see his thoughts. _We were scared to death of these people._

Johnny wore a concerned look. He paid close attention to the formation of airships out the plate glass window. "What's going on? Where's Vincent?"

Aerith shook her head. He was too far away to know for sure, but she knew just the same. "He's gone."

Johnny's face now reflected stark terror.

"Where are we going?" Gippal asked.

"To Omega Weapon," Reno said.

"What the hell's an 'Omega Weapon?'" Gippal asked.

"Go to the Temple of the Ancients, Gippal," Aerith said.

He was confused, but offered a glib smirk. "Yes, ma'am."

His second-in-command, a woman with short, gray hair, looked up from her console, clutching headphones close. "We've got a message from Tseng in Junon. He wants us to have a look at this surveillance footage."

"Put it through."

A monitor at the fore of the cockpit lit on. It no longer appeared to be in the distance. Omega Weapon filled the display. Each plodding step boomed and shook the earth.

Gippal's jaw dropped.

The first mate looked confused and then looked over her shoulder. "The Zeus Cannon is about to fire, he says."

Gippal's eyebrow quirked, concerned.

The walking ziggurat stopped, as though it could anticipate what was about to happen. The screen faded to white. Aerith thought it was interference. Then the roar of an immense explosion overwhelmed the airship's insufficient audio. The white gave way to flecks of black; scattered debris and rock. Then it gave way to static and a wobbling horizon. The camera lens zoomed and focused. A charred, black mass lay in the center of the lens' focus. It lay in the center of a crater of incalculable size.

Applause scattered the room.

Aerith did not applaud. She stood unsurprised by a shudder of movement and a glimmer of pale green. It arose, surrounded by a shimmering aura. Glowing lights like angel wings flanked its shifting form.

The light intensified. Turrets separated from its back, telescoping out and ahead. Light coalesced at their tips.

Arks of pure, holy white fired from its back, scorching the air in their wake, past the surveillance jets some; into the void of space others.

A warning alarm pierced the bridge.

Light like luminescent rainbows shot past them. One of the nearest airships vapiorized in their wake.

They turned. A horrible sound for several kilometers away rumbled. The ocean to their fore reflected the mighty flash from behind.

Aerith clenched her firsts; was barely aware of the first mate's parched voice. "Tseng, do you read? Tseng? Tseng?"

The light faded. Sound deadened.

The Lifestream whimpered.

Tseng. Scarlet. Cissnei. Barret. Thousands of others. Gone.

As the sky faded to pink and orange, streaks of sparkling white peppered the indigo sky: remnants of a shattered satellite.

Omega Weapon perched once more into the ground. Its two fore turrets lifted high above its mass. Its base glowed; fused.

Johnny leaned in closer to Aerith. "What's it doing?"

Aerith's lips stiffened. "It's getting ready."

Gippal watched with intent silence. Aerith could discern a flurry of comm. chatter even through the crew's headphones.

"How long until it's ready?" Wedge asked.

Aerith shook her head. "I have no idea."

"What's our time of arrival?" Rude asked.

"About five hours," Gippal said.

Reno walked past Gippal and picked up his radio. Aerith had never seen him so somber. She doubted many ever had. "This is Reno to the First Fleet. Hey guys. Just so you know, it's true. The senior chain of command at Shinra is basically fucked. That's it. When this is all over, we're gonna have a contest to see who can make the best incinerator out of airship parts. No more mako plants. No more leaders. Shinra's done. But you know what? You all see that big thing out there? If we don't stop it somehow, we're all dead. Maybe everyone on the planet. I don't really outrank any of you. Some of you outrank me. But I need your help. I think we can figure out how to take it down. You see… we have a secret weapon on the Highwind. It might be the only thing that can stop it. But we have to get close and we'll need your help. Do you copy?"

One by one, the dozen airships of the First Fleet reported in and formed a formation around the Highwind. Rude looked impressed, if one could ever tell anything at all from his expressions.

"What secret weapon?" Aerith asked.

Reno shrugged. "Hell. I had to say something. I guess we do have you."

"Me?"

"Yeah. That thing's a Cetra weapon. And you're the Last Cetra."

Aerith watched the monitor as Omega Weapon commenced its slow transformation. It would be a long night.

* * *

The stars shined brightest in the planet's ethereal core. Aerith had never seen them so bright—even the night before without the light pollution of Midgar. Even on the desolate, abandoned road to Nibelheim. Beads of pearly light twinkled: jewels overlaying the misty haze of the galactic center. Instead of illuminating her surroundings, she lay in a fog of shadow, sitting back to back with _him_. She had not felt the presence in so long, it almost hurt to be beside him. It was comfort. It was strength. It was compassion.

"Is it always like this here?" Aerith asked.

"It's whatever you make it out to be, really. It's the place you've always dreamed of combined with the place you know in your heart you deserve. That's why they call it the Promised Land."

"The Promised Land? I haven't heard that before."

"My mother used to talk about it. I never heard people talk about it in the city. On a clear night, you could see the Milky Way."

"I like it. I would have liked to have seen it with you."

He was silent.

"I miss you, you know," Aerith said. "I need you."

"How do you need me?"

"I've gotten into more trouble in the last couple of months than anytime in my whole life."

"You've managed yourself just fine, as far as I can tell."

"Easy for you to say."

"What makes you say that?"

Aerith smiled to herself. "I met Sephiroth. Did you know that? Maybe it wasn't all that far from here. He was in the Gold Saucer of all places. Not the real one, but a version of it here. He followed me there somehow. Do you want to know what he said?"

"What's that?"

"He said I should die. That only then could I win against Jenova and Omega Weapon."

"Well…" He hesitated. "Maybe you could that way. But that would be the easy way out for you, wouldn't it?"

"The easy way?"

"Right. Dying is easy. Sometimes… it's living that's hard. Anyone can die, anytime. Growing. Changing. Adapting. That's what's hard."

"Oh…"

"Do… do you love her?"

She sighed. "It's more complicated than that."

"Yeah. I know…"

Aerith stared into the sky. The stars darkened. The air vibrated above. "What's going on."

"It's starting."

"What?"

"The end of all of this. Omega's almost fully awakened."

"Can we do this?"

He stood. "You can. You have to."

"I know. I know you're right. I'm just glad I got to see you. One last time."

"No. I wanted to see you. I feel like… I need to be forgiven."

Aerith turned. The stars lit his shadowy profile—his lean physique—his spiked hair. "What?"

He regarded her with warm eyes of pale blue. "Promise me. After all of this is over you'll take care of her."

Aerith squinted; tried to discern his features in the dark. "Zack?"

No, he was not.

Someone squeezed her hand. "_Aerith!_"

Aerith lay sprawled against the airship's wall panels. Tifa sat up next to her, panicked. Aerith opened her eyes to see a faint shape in the distance through the airship's windshield. It grew larger and larger—its turrents nearly fused into a long pipe. No—a cannon barrel.

Aerith blinked and the flashes of luminous white light clipped the airship's bow. A flash illuminated the sky to their left. One of the airships split in half down the center. Another's fuel tanks exploded—debris falling and raining. Some of the debris collided with the turbines of a second airship and tossed it, tumbling to the ocean surface.

"Evasive maneuvers," Gippal cried.

The airship pitched and yawed. Johnny tumbled from his seat. Cait Sith tumbled through empty space and cracked against the windshield. Biggs swore loudly. The robot nearly clocked him in the skull. Reno and Rude clutched tighter to their chairs and to their credit, did not fall until the chairs' metal hinges buckled and released them. The slid along the floor from one end of the cockpit to the other.

Reno grasped at the control panel and crawled up its side. "Fire all missiles," he shouted into the radio.

Rockets flashed, streaking the night sky with vapor trails.

Omega Weapon grew larger and larger. The missiles collided with its surface and exploded, chipping away stone and metal. Omega Weapon healed itself before their very eyes. Another beam of light flashed from the weapon. An airship above and ahead of them disintegrated. The beam barely missed them.

A second later, the fuselage careened through the air, clipping the Highwind. The plate glass windshield shattered. Shards of glass and metal sprayed into the cockit and the airship's relative silence subsided to the roar of hundred-knot winds in Aerith's face.

Aerith spent the next moments, whether seconds or minutes, in abject terror. She held onto the arm of a chair until it snapped. She lost track of up from down. Her eyes closed for the debris. She felt someone grabbing her ankle and thought it might be Tifa. Another body slammed into her back before ricocheting off and away. The wind and explosive cracks of dying aircraft all-but deafened her.

And yet she could have sworn in the midst of it, she heard Reno shout, "Ram the fucker."

Because that was what happened.

The screeching of metal on metal was one of the most horrible sounds Aerith had heard in her entire life. She felt the jostle; the sudden stop and the world yanked out from under her. She was flying—free from gravity but a prisoner to intertia. She dared not look ahead.

Then she slowed—caught as though by the softest of gloves. She felt the sudden, strange calm. When she hit the alien, stone ground, she hit it hard, but at the falling speed from a second floor window—not airship cruise speed.

She sat in a haze. They all did. She opened her eyes to see everyone from the Highwind surrounding her in a chamber of dark stone—its crevices illuminated by flickers of green light shimmering like the reflections of a disturbed pool. They were injured, but not dead.

Tifa stood first. Her elbows and knees were badly scratched, but she was otherwise unhurt. "Was that you?" she asked Aerith.

Aerith fought off a wave of dizziness to stand. "No. It wasn't." _Vincent._

Reno sat upright. Rude shrugged him off his back. Both stood and straightened their badly-torn jackets.

Johnny shifted to his hands and knees and vomited.

Biggs stood, almost entirely unscathed. "I'm alive?" he said.

The first mate whose name Aerith never got stood. Gippal's leg lay by her side. He was the only unlucky one.

Yet.

"What is this place?" Tifa said.

Aerith surveyed the dark, pulsing room of stone and metal. She felt echoes of the lifestream. Whispering voices communicated with each other all around, but they spoke a language almost as old as the Forgotten Capital. Aerith could hardly understand a word.

Aerith prepared to respond to Tifa when the unheard voices rose in alarm. "Look out!" she cried, too late.

Irridescent cords and wires fired out from the walls, whipping across the room, snaring arms and legs. Reno fell first, caught in the leg. The cords dragged him to the wall and lifted. He dangled free, yelling and screaming. They caught Rude in the torso and then the right hand when he tried to fire his pistol. It discharged harmlessly in the air. Omega Weapon squealed at the sound. The first mate and Johnny ended up bound together. Biggs lay at the midpoint of the room as though he were about to be drawn and quartered.

Tifa drew the Masamune and hacked at the cord before Johnny. After three or four slashes, it shattered. Another lashed out in its place. "Get off of him," Tifa cried.

Then she stopped.

She and Aerith stood at the room's center, unmolested.

Half a dozen cords shifted, poised. Blinking lights at their tips appraised them and then withdrew.

"Go," Johnny said. "You two have to do it."

Tifa's eyes darted left and right. "But…"

"Just go. You have to stop this thing. Don't worry about us."

Aerith pulled Tifa by the hand. "We have to go, Tifa. I'm sorry."

Tifa followed Aerith down a long, dark cordidor. The Masamune dragged the floor like a nail on a chalkboard.

Blue lights illuminated the floor ahead of them—pointing the way to a stone door. Aerith led Tifa into a small room. Its wall ascended upward at a steep angle. Before disappearing into black.

The ground shuddered. The floor moved. They began their ascent to the control center. Omega Weapon's voices hushed at their approach.

Tifa clenched her fist. "What just happened, Aerith?"

Aerith swallowed. "It let us through."

"Why?"

"I'm… I'm a Cetra. That has to be it."

"Omega Weapon detained everyone else. But not you _or_ me. Why me?" Tifa turned to stare at Aerith with red-brown eyes, iridescent from mako.

"I have no idea."

"Don't lie to me, Aerith. And don't try to protect me. It's too late for that now."

"Tifa… I…"

"Is it the child I'm carrying? Or… not even that. Cloud contacted Jenova. So did Zack. But when we met Angeal after the Nibelheim incident, he knew what had happened. He said… he _felt_ it. Only he was never in Nibelheim. He'd never seen Jenova. Genesis went mad long before Sephiroth—before the Nibelheim incident. Now all the SOLDIERs are dead. Just about everyone who's been in long contact with Mako like the SOLDIERs is dead now. Except for me."

"Tifa…"

"Outside of its body, Jenova existed in the Lifesteam, like a parasite. That's how it jumped so quickly from Sephiroth to Cloud. Because part of it was already inside of him, waiting. You told me once you had an unusually clear window into Cloud's thoughts. He could always tell when you got inside his head and he didn't like it. And he never let you heal him. On some level, he knew you'd know the truth. When I was stuck in the Lifesteam for a week, Jenova infected me, didn't it?"

"I… don't know…"

"Didn't it Aerith?"

"_I don't know, okay?_"

The floor stopped its ascent. Stone doors twice their height rested before them.

"I'm sorry, Tifa. I'm not that powerful. I knew something was different about you after you came out of the Lifestream, but remember, I loved Zack and he was a SOLDIER. I never felt Jenova inside of him, if it was there at all before the Nibelheim incident."

"If something happens to Cloud. If he dies, does that mean I'll…?"

"I won't let that happen, okay?" Aerith's voice squeaked.

Tifa stood taller. "Are you ready?"

Aerith nodded once.

They approached the door. It parted before them, enshrouding them in darkness.

The room glowed an eerie, pulsating green—at once mechanical and sickly organic. It buzzed with a strange, ancient life. And it was alive—an ancient, tired lifeform with a consciousness. That consciousness lay ahead—its brain very near, unseen.

"_Why have you come? You should not be here._" The voice was monotone yet feminine. It did not speak their language, and yet, they understood.

"Who are you?" Aerith asked.

"_I was a Cetra._"

Aerith searched for the voice in the darkness. "You have to stop this then. No one's left. I'm the last and I'm only half. There's no reason to do this anymore."

"_Do you think I would create such a thing as Omega if I were not committed to the destruction of human life? I represent the first ones on Gaia, who have no voice. I shall therefore be the last._"

Aerith's eyes narrowed. "You're the High Sorceress. The one who made Jenova and Omega. No. Some sort of recording. Or ghost."

The dull thump like a heartbeat of their surroundings accelerated and whined. The green light brightened.

Before a great altar, a metallic face stared at them against the wall. Green light struck spiked blond hair in front of it.

"Cloud…" Tifa stepped closer.

Aerith held her back. "She'll die too Cloud, you know that, don't you?"

The Sorceress spoke. "_Cloud is no more. Only Jenova remains._"

The heartbeat sound amplified. The explosions outside faded. The airship fleet never stood a real chance anyway.

Aerith's eyes narrowed. "What's happening?"

Did the Sorceress laugh? "When Omega Weapon fires, the world will perish. The light of the lifestream shall spread across the earth and return all borrowed things to Minerva. You have about two minutes."

Aerith started. She grasped the materia at her sleeve, focusing her mind on her target—the mechanical face—just like Yuffie taught her many months before.

Nothing happened.

"_Your materia is merely a shard of the Lifestream. Did you possibly think you could use it against me?_"

Tifa clutched the Masamune and rushed the Sorceress' avatar. Steel grated on stone as she slashed out.

Cloud's Buster Sword parried her. They stood locked hilt to hilt, preternaturally bright eyes gleaming. The pulsing sound of Omega Weapon amplified into a whirl. The green lights brightened and flickered.

Cloud pried her away with his foot, pushing her further away. She swung at him. He barely parried. Her wing went wild. She swung again and missed altogether. The blades locked again. This time, Cloud kicked her across the room, hard.

Cloud spoke in a chilling monotone. "_You're barely trying._"

Tifa stood and coughed, staring hopeless as Omega's Cannon primed and prepared to unleash the end of all things.

The whirl became a manic scream. Lights flashed. The room seemed to go mad all around.

Aerith nearly screamed over the noise. "Cloud, the SOLDIERs are dead. Shinra's gone. The last mako plant's been destroyed. It's over."

For less than a second, Aerith saw something human in his cat-slit eyes. It was heartbreakingly hopeless.

Cloud drew his blade and pointed. Not at Tifa. At Aerith. Then he lanced across the room. It could as well have been his soul itself committed to one decisive, fatal cut through Aerith's heart.

The sword pierced skin and bone and organ.

Tifa's eyes widened. Her lip quivered. Cloud's blood flowed down her blade and onto her hands.

Cloud dropped his Buster Sword he stared into her eyes. "Tifa… Finish it."

Tifa shook her head and drew backwards. "No… No…"

Cloud clutched the blade and pulled the Masamune deeper into his chest.

Aerith crawled closer, unscathed. Her eyes met Cloud's. Then Cloud's eyes lost their focus and saw no more. He tumbled to the ground.

Tifa stifled a sob and stood.

Flashing diodes of the brightening green cast the once-dark room in light as bright as a cool spring day.

The Sorceress babbled in a language long-since dead. Her last words: incomprehensible and drowned out by a horrible shriek sucked from Gaia herself.

Cloud's inert body slid from the sword. With a flourish, his one black wing ceased to flutter.

Aerith held Cloud's emptying vessel. She wanted to cry, but she had run out of tears. Instead, she whispered. "I promise Cloud. I promise."

Omega Weapon beseeched heaven.

Tifa screamed.

The Masamune sliced metal.


	29. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

No grass ever grew upon the baren spot of bronze earth and clay overlooking the ruins of Midgar. Not even after five years. Tifa could have found the spot even without the Buster Sword thrust through the ground. There was no body below. They had salvaged little from Omega Weapon beyond their lives.

"So I finally caved and relocated Seventh Heaven to Edge City. It was a couple of months ago. It's kind of nice. Biggs is a big help. He's no-nonsense. Has a good work ethic. It's weird being his boss. Barret ran the back-of-the-house things in the old days. Not like we were ever really all that profitable. It's a lot easier when your restaurant is just a front.

"We don't have the kind of customers we had at the old Seventh Heaven. A little less dodgy, you know. Fewer international terrorists. Things in our lives change. Our priorities change. We're branding it a family restaurant, but happy hour is definitely our busiest time still. Aerith blames me.

"You'll think this is funny. Johnny is running for President under the WRO party. I like their platform. I'm still not sure I get why he got the nomination. He's a much smarter guy than you always used to think. And he's got a lot of charm. But he's also got a lot of baggage. Everyone knows he used to work under Scarlet in Public Safety. And there's this girl who used to work at the Honeybee Inn who sold her story to all the papers. It's a mess right now. I tell Aerith she should run for office. Everyone in town loves and respects her. But you know Aerith. She always has, and probably always will just want a simple life.

"But like I was saying, we finally moved to Edge. No one lives in the old Sectors anymore. Life is good. Strange, but good. Shinra used its power and utilities and technology to create this illusion we were all equal, that we weren't living in tiers of haves and have-nots. Maybe I started to realize on our journey we all become slaves to something or someone sometime in our lives. Most of the time we never realize it."

Tifa sniffled. "Your son is beautiful. You'd love him so much. He's shy like you were. It's cute. But he knows he's loved. So far as he knows, Marlene is his real sister. I wish you could have known him. I wish for so much, but there comes a point when you have to say 'it is what it is.' It was hard for me to accept that you were gone. It never gets easier, but I've learned to live without you over time. I'm just sorry. Everyone who still knows and who still remembers what happened remembers you as this evil thing. I'm sorry for that."

As the tears came closer to the fore, she realized again there was not much else she could say. "You were a hero. You lived as a hero and you died a hero. I love you. I love you and always will."

Tifa blew a kiss, touching her fingertips to the corroded blade.

Tifa laid the white lilies upon the _ad hoc_ memorial. It would forever exist unmolested as a curiosity. Someday no one alive would remember, but she would always know, until the day the planet consumed the last flicker of her soul.

The air seemed more oppressive at the top of the ridge. Then she approached her motorcycle's resting spot. The wind caught a lock her auburn hair and sensitive green eyes sparkled. The world seemed less dark.

Aerith straightened her back. "Are you ready to head back?"

Tifa smiled. _You would have loved her, Cloud._ "Yeah. Let's go." She mounted the motorcycle. Aerith climbed on behind her and clasped her around the waist. Tifa lit the engine. They turned back to the city: a sprawling oasis of grass, trees, and flowers that started to grow within a year of the mako plants' destruction. Construction equipment checkered the landscape, building homes, offices, and even highrises. A flight of condors passed overhead. Some had taken up residence in the burnt-out ruins of Shinra tower.

Tifa rode past Loveless Lane. The baker, Gourmand they all called him, nodded with a cordial smile. The neighbor's twins, Porom and Palam, ran along the edge of the cobblestone road, laughing, and smiling.

Tifa stopped in the garage alongside Seventh Heaven: a new building smelling of fresh cedar. They passed beneath the bright sign that read, "Texas." Aerith rubbed their red one-eyed cat's belly. "You know," Aerith said, "Johhny wants me to be his running mate."

Tifa froze. "Are you serious?"

"Of course. He says I'm great at reading people."

"He just wants a female running mate because of that Honeybee Inn girl."

Aerith shrugged. "Maybe."

"You're not really going to do it, are you?"

"I've thought about it seriously. I mean, there's really no money in being a florist anymore. Not now that flowers grow everywhere."

"Maybe if it were any other candidate."

Aerith giggled and leaned in closer to Tifa's face. "You're cute when you're jealous."

Since her mako emersion, Tifa retained the wired reflexes of a SOLDIER. Still, she found herself unable to dodge the peck on her lips: lighter and breezier than any kiss of Cloud's. She blushed hotly. Even after all the years.

"Seriously, I think I enjoy being a mother too much, Tifa."

"Have you ever thought about becoming a biological mother? I mean, we're both still young. We could find a donor. And you really are the last of the Cetra. That means once you die, that's it. No more."

Aerith flashed her a goofy self-conscious smile and just shook her head.

"I just thought you might want to think about it."

Aerith cast her eyes downward. "I think about Vincent a lot, you know. And his offer. And what it meant."

"He loved you. He loved you until the end. He gave his life for you."

"True… but there are better ways of showing your love than giving your life."

Tifa frowned. "We're alike there. That's what Cloud did. Sometimes I still think about that. What if I am really the last person on Gaia who was exposed to Mako long-term? What if Jenova's still there? Inside of me some…"

"Tifa? Aerith?" It was Biggs. He turned the corner nearest the bar, still buffing a glass tumbler. "Back already?"

"Yeah," Tifa said. "Anything much happen while we were gone?"

"Actually yeah. Reno stopped by and wanted to see the kids…"

Tifa gasped. "Wait, wait… Reno? You mean Turk Reno?"

Her reaction surprised Biggs. "Well… yeah… I mean… I figured we could trust him, what after everything he did to help in the fight against Omega."

"Biggs! You have no idea who he's working for or what he wants. You think he's sentimental or something?"

Aerith glanced upstairs. "Is he still…?"

Biggs blinked.

Footsteps descended the staircase. It was Reno. A flustered, hurried Reno.

Tifa intercepted him. "What the hell were you doing with the kids?"

Tifa caught Aerith studying him with an intent, curious glare.

Reno shook his head. "I… uh…" He tried to bowl straight past them.

Tifa caught him with one hand. "If you want to visit, call. Otherwise, don't ever come in here without my permission again."

Reno acknowledged her and rushed out.

Aerith watched Reno leave. "Tifa… he's scared."

Tifa nodded once. They strode up the stairs together, ignoring Biggs' incoherent babbling.

Tifa stopped at the top of the stairs. "Kids?"

They echanged conspiratory whispers.

"Yes, Mom?" Marlene said.

Tifa and Aerith entered together. Marlene stood side by side with Sora. He favored Cloud more day by day. She favored Aerith despite no biological kinship. They both stood erect, side by side.

"Are you both okay?" Aerith asked.

"Of course," Marlene said too quickly. She and Sora glanced at each other and… smirked?

Tifa relaxed. "I'm having a talk with Uncle Biggs. Never talk to strangers like that again, okay?"

They both made eye contact with each other and nodded in unison.

"Go downstairs," Tifa said. "We'll have a snack."

The children rushed down the steps.

Aerith turned away and watched them retreat down the stairs. "What was _that?_"

"You're supposed to be the telepathic one."

"Children and animals are hard."

Tifa noticed the open window and approached. She stifled a gasp. "Aerith?"

Aerith did not turn. "Hm?" When Tifa did not answer, she turned. "What is it?"

Tifa remained still, facing the open window. "Which is a greater act of love? Giving your life for the one you love or living knowing you can never be together?"

Aerith scrunched her eyebrows. "What are you talking about?"

"Nothing." Tifa would not turn. "I'll be down in a minute. Would you mind getting them set up with some cactaur juice?"

Aerith did not understand, but they had known each other long enough that she knew she did not always have to understand. She nodded and descended the stairs.

Tifa closed the window and picked up the object on its sill. She carried it into the master bedroom and locked it in the drawer of her nightstand. She would keep it hidden there forever if not for a handful of long, cold nights that made her ponder the reason for life and the world.

The feather was enormous. No crow or raven ever grew such a great, black wing.

_End_

* * *

_A/N: That's it-that's all she wrote (for now)! __This fic has been a fun couple of years in the making. Double thanks to everyone who's been there through the process. __The reviews and feedback were invaluable and I feel I've strengthened as a writer because of it. Special thanks and love to AchikaMiyu for keeping me on the straight-and-narrow through it all (and nudging the plot here and there on the way)!_

___Thanks for reading!_


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